A biography for John Lithgowhasn’t been written yet.
“Whenever I play a role, it's like I've been kidnapped inside my own body.”
“I loved growing up in Ohio.”
“My hairline is receding. So my days as a romantic lead - even though I've never had them - are behind me.”
“Everybody's a dreamer.”
“It's a very tough time for the playwright. Broadway has become almost a musical comedy theme park with all these long-running shows.”
“It's pretty rare that I see a film that I did a long, long time ago.”
“When good things come along, you end up saying yes to them. Because they're rare.”
“I was in 20 Shakespearean plays by the time I was 20.”
“I loved playing Roberta Muldoon!”
“If you're an actor, you tend to fool yourself into thinking you're much younger than you are because you're playing parts and behaving like a child all the time.”
“When you end a successful sitcom, the most sensible thing to do is go back to the theater.”
“Anytime a culture is in economic stress, ugly things start happening.”
“The way I approach acting when there's a real life character, it's sort of like a Venn diagram. What I come up with is some amalgam of the two of us.”
“The essence of comedy, drama, and horror is surprise. I have an uncanny ability to surprise people because they look at my face, and they don't know where I'm going.”
“I'm probably a better granddad than dad because your role as a grandfather is to be fun, and I'm fun.”
“I'm a very slow and ponderous reader, but I'm dogged.”
“My worst audition was for Tim Burton for 'Batman.'”
“Time sneaks up on you like a windshield on a bug.”
“Grown adults often tell me that they used to sit, as children with their parents, and watch '3rd Rock from the Sun,' and they would all enjoy it for completely different reasons. I think that's part of the magic of the show.”
“The Wodehouse language is so rich and detailed and hilarious.”