Jeanne Moreau was a French actress, singer, screenwriter and director. She won the Cannes Film Festival Award for Best Actress for Seven Days… Seven Nights (which she shared with Melina Mercouri for her role in Never on Sunday), the BAFTA Award for Best Foreign Actress for Viva Maria! and the César Award for Best Actress for The Old Lady Who Walked in the Sea. She was also the recipient of several lifetime awards, including a BAFTA Fellowship in 1996, Cannes Golden Palm in 2003 and César Award in 2008.
Moreau was a close friend of Sharon Stone, who presented a American Academy of Motion Pictures life tribute to Moreau at the Samuel Goldwyn Theater, academy headquarters in Beverly Hills. Orson Welles called her “the greatest actress in the world”, and she remained one of France’s most accomplished actresses. (via Wikipedia)
A few of her great quotes are listed below:
On Life:
I don’t like going where I’ve already been. Life is a myriad of territories to discover. I don’t want to waste time with what I already know.
You don’t have to be a wreck. You don’t have to be sick. One’s aim in life should be to die in good health. Just like a candle that burns out.
My life is very exciting now. Nostalgia for what? It’s like climbing a staircase. I’m on the top of the staircase, I look behind and see the steps. That’s where I was. We’re here right now. Tomorrow, we’ll be someplace else. So why nostalgia?
My aim in life is not to judge.
As long as you don’t make waves, ripples, life seems easy. But that’s condemning yourself to impotence and death before you are dead.
I don’t like the idea of separating life and work. That notion seems dated and a bit alien to me.
It’s just as idiotic to say there is no life after death as it is to say there is one.
To give a character life in a short space of time, it helps if you arrive on screen with a past.
On Love:
To give and receive love, you have to be in touch with pain, you have to be capable of provoking it and feeling it.
When Tony was madly in love with me, his relationship with Vanessa Redgrave was ending.
Success is like a liberation or the first phrase of a love story.
Women will not talk about football unless one of them is in love with a football player, and then suddenly you discover that they know everything that is to be known about it.
On Death:
Death is an absolute mystery. We are all vulnerable to it, it’s what makes life interesting and suspenseful.
On Success:
I don’t think success is harmful, as so many people say. Rather, I believe it indispensable to talent, if for nothing else than to increase the talent.
Success is like a liberation or the first phrase of a love story.
Other Quotes:
Every night I go over what I did in the day, in ethical or moral terms. Have I treated people properly? Did I tell the truth?
I have no doubt who I am.
During rehearsals I am confronted by things very mysterious. I have terrific fights with inner demons, and it’s more painful than it ever was.
If you’re extremely, painfully frightened of age, it shows.
Nostalgia is when you want things to stay the same. I know so many people staying in the same place.