Tony Curtis

At 17, I dreamed of seeing the world. At 19, I had been around the world and back.

For instance, I always have one hanging in Budapest in the mayors office.

Everywhere I go in the world, people know me and recognise me and really show affection for me.

The movie business is very twisted, out of site, out of mind, you know.

Yes I'm still working, but my life's no longer filled with it.

I can't sit around and wait for the telephone to ring.

But my longevity is due to my good timing.

I like Vegas for its spontaneity.

If you know how to live in Vegas you can have the best time.

I enlisted when I was a boy. The Navy looked after me like my mother. It fed me, took care of me and gave me wonderful opportunities.

I've just opened a show in Florida, although I also have many pieces on display around the world.

I joined the Navy hoping to be submariner and ended up in the sub service aboard a tender in the Pacific.

The service meant so much to me. You don't know privileged I feel and how lucky I am to have served.

I've been in the movies for 50 years, I've made 130 some-odd movies.

I'm world famous, everywhere I go there are people who love me because of I've been able to bring them some joy from the movies I've made.

Now I'm a painter. That was another opportunity I was able to pursue, I've been painting all my life, now it's become a second career because of my success in the movies.

My whole world before I joined the Navy was my neighborhood in the Bronx.

We often don't think of them, we think of the great wars and the great battles, but what about losing a son or a daughter, or a girl losing her husband or vice versa? I think of the people who never got the chance to have the opportunities I had.

They gave me away as a prize once - a Win Tony Curtis For A Weekend competition. The woman who won was disappointed. She'd hoped for second prize - a new stove.

I was born in and worked in a period that could be called enviable.

Painting is much more than therapy to me its a way of life.

Its not age as much as the experiences I have had.

It's such a human condition, whether you're a great track star or a great knitting person or you paint watercolors - someone knows who you are.

I don't know what organically grown chickens are; I've never seen one.

The government gave me enough money to go to acting school.