“A lot of actors never talk to other actors about how they're doing things, or why. I think it's important to share the way you're thinking.”

“Acting is a mix of luck and choice. I got lucky.”

“And now after all this time I finally figured out how to trap him... I will become him.”

“Autism and seizures are the least known areas of illnesses.”

“For a while, I was saying 'no' way too often. I turned down 'An Officer and A Gentleman,' 'Splash' and 'Midnight Express.' I could name you tons more. I would go off and experience life instead of working - I was learning to fly jets, went on an African safari, sailed the Caribbean - which wasn't necessarily bad.”

“Good writing is good writing, but that doesn't mean you can't orchestrate it or tweak it.”

“He lives with his creativity in high gear.”

“I actually do like playing off-beat people. I think it's more fun.”

“I believe L. Ron Hubbard resolved the human mind, and in resolving it he has also resolved human pain - that's what I really think has happened here.”

“I don't believe in regrets; I believe your future is in your tomorrows.”

“I don't mind gearing my life towards privacy. It's my nature.”

“I don't want to create controversy; I just have an opinion on things, and there is nothing wrong with stating your opinion if you are asked. Everyone wants that right, and because you are famous doesn't mean you have less of a right.”

“I have a dance background. I have an athletic background.”

“I have to believe there's some other life force out there. I don't know in what form. But we can't have all these galaxies and universes without something going on.”

“I learned early on to stay away from gossip magazines and reviews. That stuff just makes you unhappy, and I know actors that read everything that's written about them and they're miserable. You can choose what to let into your life.”

“I love being regarded as a sex symbol, but I can't take it too seriously.”

“I love fun movies that also have something to say. They tend to stay with me, always.”

“I played football in the ninth and 10th grade. I looked a lot like Joe Namath, so I think my looks got me there more than my abilities.”

“I think aerobatic flying is athletic. I don't do aerobatic flying, but I would put that in a category of a sport. I would put regular flying in the category of an art or machine-type thing.”

“I think, for sure, 'Saturday Night Fever' and 'Pulp Fiction' were kind of bookends for - or the pillars of - my career.”

“I think my friend Tom Hanks knows me. He understands me very well. He's always had a sort of parental feeling toward me. He knows I'm a big mush ball, which is just part of my personality.”

“I was just thinking of James Dean and Marilyn Monroe and how young they were when they died. I would like to be a pop icon who survives. I would like to be a living icon.”

“I will direct one day, but I have a feeling that it will be very limited.”

“I wouldn't trade my career with anybody's. I'd trade a few movies with Tom Hanks - 'Apollo 13' and 'Forrest Gump' - but other than that, I love my career.”

“I'm definitely working class, and I still believe in those values. I know that losing everything would not be an unfamiliar feeling. Meaning, if you don't have it anymore, you didn't have it to begin with.”

“I'm not big on sequels; I've done them, but I like doing little things that have their own timelessness to them, classic type things, and then you go onto something new.”

“I'm realizing that for so much of my life I had an older viewpoint; I saw things as an older person. That's common among change-of-life babies. So I have this dichotomy where I'm either, like, super young or feel like I'm coming to the end of my years.”

“I'm willing to look my own nightmare on film, but if it endangers my life, then I'm willing to put my life before movies.”

“It's easier to be responsible for the decisions that you've made yourself than for the ones that other people have made for you.”

“It's hard to make a cultural phenomenon every time.”

“It's the interviewee's job to know that his privacy is going to be invaded on some level. Otherwise, you are better off not doing the interview.”

“I've always had an innate ability to dance, but I'm not as spiffy as those cinema legends like Gene Kelly and Fred Astaire.”

“I've always thought of, of a relationship with an actor to an audience as a marriage, you know. And a story, you know. And there are ups and downs, and you work through them, and you work with them.”

“I've done so many interviews that I've gotten past the ego and the personality.”

“My kids probably stay up too late. My wife goes to bed around 3 A.M., and I follow around 7 A.M., but it works.”

“My son was autistic, and he suffered from seizure disorder every 5 to 10 days. He would suffer a seizure that would last 45 seconds to a minute and sleep for 12 hours.”

“People make judgments about Scientology, but often they don't know what they're talking about.”

“Playing a bad guy is always a freeing experience, because you don't have the same envelope of restrictions as you have playing a good guy. Good guys restrain themselves; they kind of have their moral fiber cut out for them in varying degrees.”

“Princess Diana was a nice dancer because she had confidence. In fact, when we danced together she started to lead, and I looked her in eye and went, 'No, you have to let me lead.' So I grabbed her around the waist and we were off to the races.”

“Scientology is one of the least homophobic religions. It's not very interested in the body at all.”

“So you know what I'm gonna do? I'm gonna do something really outrageous, I'm gonna tell the truth.”

“Something can happen in your life, and you might want and need something different from your spouse. Most people forget that you have to create relationships. The allure of the first years settles down, and at that moment, you better start creating it; otherwise, you're going to lose out.”

“The first thing I ever rode when I was a kid was a motorcycle, so I knew how to drive a motorcycle before a car.”

“The good and wonderful thing about my whole career is that I've always felt that the audience, if I do it well, will track wherever I go, whether it's President or a lawyer or bad guy or good. All I have to do is execute the material enough where they buy into it. I've had the great luxury of the audiences accepting that.”

“There are unwanted emotions and pain that goes along with any birth.”

“When I say 'yes' to a movie it's usually because, to a greater or lesser extent, it's because I'm enthusiastic about the character. How well that character ultimately comes off depends on a lot of things: your relationship with the director and so on. But at first, you're on board because you think you can do something with it.”

“When my mother died, it sort of put a damper on things. My career didn't have the same significance or excitement. It had always been about doing well for my family - my brothers, sisters, father, mother. Then something interesting and important happened - I started doing things for me.”

“With some actors, you can tell when they're acting all by themselves, no matter who else is in the screen.”

“You can't control the quality of projects that are coming to you, so if you get several in a row that are quality, you take them.”

“You feel alive to the degree that you feel you can help others.”

“You just activated a nuclear warhead, my friend.”

“Your life starts to take shape at 30. You don't have to make excuses for who you are anymore.”