Top 45 Kevin Costner Quotes

I haven’t tried to buffer myself. I like rolling the dice.

I had a difficult time hearing my own inner voice about what I wanted to be in this life, because there were all these perfect examples of what a man actually does. The notion is that he goes to college, gets married and provides. That’s what a man does.

I know I have this level of celebrity, of fame, international, national, whatever you want to call it, but it’s a pretty surreal thing to think sometimes that you’re in the middle of another famous person’s life and you think to yourself, ‘How the hell did I get famous? What is this some weird club that we’re in?’

One person doesn’t have to shoulder all the responsibility for why a film does or doesn’t do well.

I wait and take on projects that I think can work.

I am a really writer-oriented actor.

I enjoy sports. I get a real joy from playing sports but I don’t look for those movies. Oliver Stone wanted to know if I would do Any Given Sunday and it just didn’t appeal to me.

I like American history.

I work for the public, for the people who are paying to go to the cinema, rather than for the critics.

I’m a pretty convenient foil for a lot of people.

You have to decide if you’re going to wilt like a daisy or if you’re just going to go forward and live the life that you’ve been granted.

If you’re willing to tell somebody that you love them, are you also willing to say you’re sorry? You need to, even when you think you’re in the right.

We still live with this unbelievable threat over our heads of nuclear war. I mean, are we stupid? Do we think that the nuclear threat has gone, that the nuclear destruction of the planet is not imminent? It’s a delusion to think it’s gone away.

You have to try to dismiss the loudness of cynicism. It’s certainly going to come.

Field of Dreams is probably our generation’s It’s A Wonderful Life.

I try to please myself. I don’t try to anticipate what people want to see.

I wanted very much to do Traffic and at one point it looked like I was going to work on it. And then, of course, Catherine Zeta-Jones had her relationship with Michael Douglas and it suddenly didn’t happen.

I am not a cynic.

When I make a film I’m away from home for two to three months. So I want my kids to look at my films one day and say, I love his movies, I love his choices-because he loved them.

I’ve been around where I knew other actors were going to steal the scene, and I don’t compete with them.

What are we blaming? Is this Vietnam? We made a movie, it didn’t make much money. I’m gonna be really happy if somebody watches it in 10 years’ time and really enjoys it.

There are a lot of things that come to bear on movies now that I don’t think are good for movies. They’re trying to appeal to the biggest demographic and, when they do that, you sometimes flatten out.

I’m in a position where whatever I do, I can get my head handed to me. I’m in a position to fail because there is a whole group of people out there who want me to fail. It’s a weird vibe.

If it’s going to be wrecked, I want to make sure I wreck it.

I’ve had some movies that have been ridiculed, but that’s OK with me. I don’t feel that really defines me. Should I change who I am to be popular?

I split my time between Santa Barbara and Aspen. I live on a pretty fast horse.

I’m a big fan of dreams. Unfortunately, dreams are our first casualty in life – people seem to give them up, quicker than anything, for a ‘reality.’

I’ve always known that I’m a little out of vogue.

When I see my children, and when I see the people who value me, I know how lucky I am.

I was sucked into this vortex of a very conservative upbringing.

I don’t think I ever take huge risks, though I’m not scared of doing so.

I believe people who go into politics want to do the right thing. And then they hit a big wall of re-election and the pettiness of politics. In the end, politics gets in the way of the business of people.

I stand up for what I believe. I don’t know if it’s always paid off for me, because I’ve been ridiculed and humiliated.

I haven’t lived a perfect life. I have regrets. But that’s from a lifetime of taking chances, making decisions, and trying not to be frozen. The only thing that I can do with my regrets is understand them.

I like when my face tingles, when the hair on the back of my neck stands up.

If you think of ‘Liberty Valance’ or ‘The Searchers,’ there are moments in there that you’ll never, ever forget… And it does not matter what century you are from.

I like four-hour movies.

If you’re going to tear down a hero, you should never forget that you’re tearing down someone else’s hero. You’re tearing down somebody else’s son. You might have to face her one day.

Being a celebrity is probably the closest to being a beautiful woman as you can get.

I don’t feel the need to direct. I tried to get other people to direct Dances, but they wouldn’t do it. They all thought it was too long. One director wanted to cut the Civil War sequence. Another thought the white woman was very cliched.

We stand our best chance of leaving a legacy to those who want to learn, our children, by standing firm. In matters of style, hey, swing with the stream. But in matters of principle, you need to stand like a rock.

When I read Thirteen Days I was moved by it. It was just a great time for the world, in terms of looking back in history and seeing how we got ourselves into trouble and how we got ourselves out of trouble.

Failure doesn’t kill you… it increases your desire to make something happen.

I’m proud of all the movies I’ve made. They’re not sequels, they’re not franchises. And the reason I pick my films carefully is that I don’t want to spit on my life. I like to think of myself as more than that.

There’s real drama in performing live. You never know how it’s going to be.