In the 50s, when me and Natalie Wood and James Dean and Nick Adams and Tony Perkins (Anthony Perkins) suddenly arrived... God, it was a whole group of us that sort of felt like that earlier group - the John Barrymores, Errol Flynns, Sinatras, Clifts - were a little farther out than we were... So we tried to emulate that lifestyle. For instance, once Natalie and I decided we`d have an orgy. And Natalie says "O.K., but we have to have a champagne bath." So we filled the bathtub full of champagne. Natalie takes off her clothes, sits down in the champagne, starts screaming. We take her to the emergency hospital. That was *our* orgy, you understand?

[talking on the phone with David Lynch after reading the Blue Velvet (1986) script] David, you have to let me play Frank because I am Frank.

The alcohol was awful. I was a terrible alcoholic. I mean, people used to ask how much drugs I did. I said, `I only do drugs so I can drink more`. I was doing the coke so I could drink more. I mean, I don`t know any other reason. I`d start drinking in the morning. I`d drink all day long.

I should have been dead ten times over. I`ve thought about that a lot. I believe in miracles. It`s an absolute miracle that I`m still around.

I`ve been a Republican since Reagan. I voted for Bush and his father. I don`t tell a lot of people, because I live in a city where somebody who voted for Bush is really an outcast.

[on James Dean] Jimmy was the most talented and original actor I ever saw work. He was also a guerrilla artist who attacked all restrictions on his sensibility. Once he pulled a switchblade and threatened to murder his director. I imitated his style in art and in life. It got me in a lot of trouble.

[about his 8 days marriage with Michelle Phillips] The first seven were pretty good.

[Quote from 2001]: I`ve been sober now for 18 years. With all the drugs, psychedelics and narcotics I did, I was [really] an alcoholic. Honestly, I only used to do cocaine so I could sober up and drink more. My last five years of drinking was a nightmare. I was drinking a half-gallon of rum with a fifth of rum on the side, in case I ran out, 28 beers a day, and three grams of cocaine just to keep me moving around. And I thought I was doing fine because I wasn`t crawling around drunk on the floor.

[1997]: Like all artists I want to cheat death a little and contribute something to the next generation.

There are moments that I`ve had some real brilliance, you know. But I think they are moments. And sometimes, in a career, moments are enough. I never felt I played the great part. I never felt that I directed the great movie. And I can`t say that it`s anybody`s fault but my own.