Top 50 Keith Allen Quotes

I have no ambition whatsoever. I don’t know whether that’s because I’m afraid of losing, or of failure – of not being the best.

I hate technically constructed actors. In fact, I hate anything technically constructed, unless it’s a bridge.

Vanity takes a lot of work. I’m too lazy to be vain.

If you look at the people in the Occupy and tax-evading movements, they come from all walks of life and have embraced that attitude of opposition from the 1970s.

I guess there’s a part of me that loves institutionalism. And borstal is tailor-made for you to buck against. It was perfect.

I was always a late developer – in every field.

My mother was Welsh and I loved going to Wales every summer, where Uncle Les had a farm. My mother had seven brothers and a sister and they were all very close. There would always be food on the table and uncles coming in and out. My father’s family were English and lived in London, and we didn’t really see them.

I have never ever hung out with actors and comedians. I can’t stand it.

I don’t suffer from what I believe a lot of actors suffer from, in that they have to do certain things to be an actor, like endlessly study the script and endlessly think about the character. I wouldn’t advise that to anybody.

Without history we are nothing, so it’s worth finding out something about it.

Journalists have so much newsprint to fill, the details are the last of their considerations.

I have a focused career plan, which is not to have a focused career plan.

I always do things for myself and I don’t care about what people think.

It’s much easier being a father to girls. Boys are just horrible. Then girls come into their own around 12 when they’re nightmares too.

The act of littering annoys me more than anything, particularly drivers who throw stuff out of the car window.

My father was in the navy. I always found it a bit strange that he would choose to spend an extraordinary amount of time underneath the water in a submarine with 60 men.

I’d done performance art sporadically from about 1976 – very personal street things on my own. Acting seemed like a natural step from that. But I didn’t really want to ‘be’ anything: presenter, comic, actor. I just wanted to perform.

There must be something about me and teeth when I’m filming abroad, I don’t have a lot of luck.

My whole life has been a holiday!

We are governed by consumerism and it’s terrible when that is all that life is geared to.

I do a very good Sunday roast.

If you’re on a film set for 48 weeks of the year, you’re nowhere near reality. You can’t emote like a human being.

I am certain things to certain generations. Lots of people remember me from the ‘Comic Strip,’ there was the ‘Vindaloo’ song for the 1998 World Cup, then it was playing the Sheriff of Nottingham in the BBC’s ‘Robin Hood.’

I hardly ever drink.

I was brought up on stuffed hearts, cabbage and mashed potatoes. It’s repulsive, when I look back – I used to go to the butchers to get Mum’s sausages, and I would cut one off and squeeze the inside of it straight into my mouth. Insane!

I don’t like the taste of alcohol.

I don’t like going to parties, I like having parties at home.

Women want to be entertained. They want value for money from a man. You have to have the whole package.

I’m a jack of all trades, master of none.

Unlike virtually everyone else, I know how to work a room. That comes in pretty handy. If you’re not getting any laughs, then at least you can make people watch you.

I love all aspects of performance.

We make our own pesto. Our own chutney and jams.

I’m delighted that the BBC has given me the chance to delve into the murky world of ‘The Body Farm.’

A performer, that’s what I am, only I can perform in different areas.

I knew Joe Strummer back in the days before he formed the Clash.

One Direction prove you can generate success from anything.

I’m primarily an actor and only make documentaries when I see a story others have missed.

My childhood hero was Roy Rogers.

I’m very good at pretending to be subservient; I’m really good at it.

The Internet is a global lavatory wall, a Rabelaisian mixture of truth, lies, insanity and humour.

There’s so much mythologising around me.

I can’t have wet wool next to my skin because it really affects it.

I’m in love with corrugated iron buildings, especially chapels and churches.

I’ve been on the edge of everything, like one of those characters at the side of a Brueghel painting with a warty nose. I’ve been very lucky – I lived through three of the most profoundly important musical revolutions of the 20th century: latterday rock and roll, punk and then the rave culture.

You can’t learn how to have presence. I walk into a room and people say ‘I wonder where he’s been?’ When other people walk in, they say ‘I wonder where he’s going?’

I didn’t really do any acting until I was about 28. I just did odd jobs.

People using a public platform to further their own personal agenda, I think that’s immoral. You have no right to do that. Tony Blair is a great example of that.

Women are women’s own worst enemy. They rip each other apart.

I love reading when I’m on holiday.

I would have loved to have been in Hong Kong, or China, in around the 18th century.