Gena Rowlands Quotes

People in independent film have a passion; they're not in it for the money.

You just can't complain about being alive. It's self-indulgent to be unhappy. When asked how she has coped since husband's death.

It was more freedom than I think most people get when they're starting out - or even when they're not starting out. He [John Cassavetes] did his thing and I did whatever I thought.

If I have something I like to forget, then I forget it.

I love independent filmmaking. I don't agree with a lot of it, but that's the point.

When I went to my parents I was at the University of Wisconsin, and I just couldn't wait anymore to go be an actress.

Never in my life have I ever even thought about anything else [ being anything other than an actress].

I loved Bette Davis when I was little and when I was big and when I got old.

Of course, much easier to do a film when you're doing an extremely emotional part than it is doing it onstage over and over especially.

I think I have the only parents in the world who would not have said something against become an actress.

I just loved Bette Davis and the fact that I had a chance to work with her [on the 1979 TV movie Strangers: The Story of a Mother and Daughter] was momentous.

Bette Davis had very strong opinions and was not afraid to express them. She wasn't afraid of anything that I ever saw. And she was so funny. She's just funny and she was laughing all the time.

He[John Cassavetes] was just being an actor. A very successful actor, especially in live TV. He did many wonderful performances.

So many people mistakenly think that the rest of his [John Cassavetes] pictures and the ones we did were improvised, which isn't true. He wrote all the rest of them.

I'd wanted to be [an actress] all my life.

So after the Shadows he acted and directed. And it worked out very nicely. And he wrote, obviously.

Paddy Chayefksy was writing and it was a time where everybody was happy to be there [on TV].

I went to the American Academy of Dramatic Arts, which was in Carnegie Hall, which itself was exciting - just to walk into it.

After you play a part, you think of it as your own.

Every sacred cow in the business has to do with economics.

[John Cassavetes] came backstage afterwards and introduced himself and we talked a bit, and then went for a little coffee at the Russian Tea Room next door. It just...started.

A Woman Under the Influence was my favorite. I loved doing that. And it was challenging.

I read the script of [Woman Under the Influence ] 50 times. And I thought about it. And then I did it.

Of course I would change anything if John Cassavetes said so - it's his script. But he was very easy about that.

I think that I was lucky to have that period of time [ like coming to New York] because everything was so exciting and new.