It's becoming increasingly harder and harder; there's no such thing as independent film anymore. There aren't any, they don't exist. In the old days you could go and get a certain amount of the budget with foreign sales, now everybody wants a marketable angle.

- Gary Oldman

Well, I needed the work - that's the honest answer. I haven't worked for a while, a couple of years. So I thought it would be nice to get back to work and earn some money.

- Gary Oldman

I love the simple poetry of theater, where you can stand in a spotlight on a stage and wrap a coat around you, and say, 'It was 1860 and it was winter...'

- Gary Oldman

Political correctness has become a straightjacket.

- Gary Oldman

There will always be spies. We have to have them. Without them we wouldn't have got Osama bin Laden - it took us years, but it happened.

- Gary Oldman

Speaking very generally, I find that women are spiritually, emotionally, and often physically stronger than men.

- Gary Oldman

Culturally, politically, everywhere you look... Read the newspaper. Go online. Our world has gone to hell.

- Gary Oldman

Getting sober was one of the three pivotal events in my life, along with becoming an actor and having a child. Of the three, finding my sobriety was the hardest thing.

- Gary Oldman

My passion and energy get mistaken for anger.

- Gary Oldman

I'm probably a Libertarian, if I had to put myself in any category. But you don't come out and talk about these things, for obvious reasons.

- Gary Oldman

I'm not the best audience for that because I'm not a great science-fiction fan. I just never got off on space ships and space costumes, things like that.

- Gary Oldman

I applaud anything that can take a kid away from a PlayStation or a Gameboy. That is a miracle in itself.

- Gary Oldman

People who know me, they know I have a sense of humor, I'm a bit of a joker, a bit of a clown really, and I would love someone to exploit that side of me and send me a romantic comedy.

- Gary Oldman

I know what it means to do a job... I worked in a factory. I respect people in the service industry. What irritates me more is when people aren't respectful. There's a lot of nonsense behavior, especially in a place like Hollywood. The money, the power, they create little monsters.

- Gary Oldman

A lazy man works twice as hard. My mother told that to me, and now I say it to my kids. If you're writing an essay, keep it in the lines and in the margins so you don't have to do it over.

- Gary Oldman

You choose your friends by their character and your socks by their color.

- Gary Oldman

Your own barometer is all you have to go by, and often what makes a good director is knowing when not to say something. On occasions you can find yourself on a film set where the person who is wearing the director's hat is only trying to justify his position.

- Gary Oldman

I was quiet, a loner. I was one of those children where, if you put me in a room and gave me some crayons and a pencils, you wouldn't hear from me for nine straight hours. And I was always drawing racing cars and rockets and spaceships and planes, things that were very fast that would take me away.

- Gary Oldman

And costume is so important for an actor. It absolutely helps to get into character; it's the closest thing to you, it touches you. Some actors like to go into make-up and then put their clothes on, but I like to dress first; that's my routine.

- Gary Oldman

Change is vital to any actor. If you keep playing lead after lead, you're really gonna dry up. Because all those vehicles wean you away from the truths of human behaviour.

- Gary Oldman