Quotes By Harvey Fierstein

When I write stuff and I help cast it, I turn away good people all the time. I may turn them down because this one's too tall and that one doesn't have a high enough voice or this one looks to old to match up with that one - there's a billion reasons not to hire somebody.

And I believe that you never be limited in what you do, so I like to do movies, I like to do television.

The world is full of more interesting things than my voice.

It's through sheer will that I can sing.

What looks absolutely fabulous in rehearsal can fall flat in front of an audience. The audience dictates what you do or don't change.

But actually just yesterday we raised the key of one of my songs two steps up, so my voice is obviously responding. It's a muscle, and the more you use it, the more you use it right, the more you should get out of it. So yes, I sing.

The great thing about suicide is that it's not one of those things you have to do now or you lose your chance. I mean, you can always do it later.

To work all the time is to be incredibly lucky.

I actually may do a musical next year... not one that I've written; one that I may star in. Plus my concert and other people's work and all of a sudden you've got a very full life.

So, did I work with Warhol? I worked with him less on that play then I did on other things. He actually did a portrait of my rabbit and some other stuff. Warhol was definitely... Warhol.

Time will tell us what we did and didn't do.

Never be bullied into silence. Never allow yourself to be made a victim. Accept no one's definition of your life; define yourself.

It's a lot of fun to play someone you don't normally think of yourself as.

In London they don't like you if you're still alive.

I have to work really hard, eight shows a week, to get a nice check as an actor. But when I write a play, and it's a - knock wood - hit, the checks come in for many years.

As soon as I started writing, other writers stopped wanting me acting in their shows - maybe they thought I was going to rewrite them.

You really, really, really have to love what you are going to do in theater because it is an unmerciful life. It's six days a week. It's eight performances a week. And that's doing the exact same thing over and over and over again.

Art has the power to transform, to illuminate, to educate, inspire and motivate.

There are times when I don't take roles because I don't want to be perceived a certain way.

My play Safe Sex was picked apart because critics thought it was untrue. It was a play in which no one had AIDS, but the characters talked about how it was going to change their lives.

Political movements always belong to the young.

How time files when you's doin' all the talking.

Well, I always looked at Mulan as a movie about a lesbian coming out.

I don't believe in the afterlife, so I do think when somebody passes, it's worthy of note.

I'm sure there's going to be some material from This Is Not Going To Be Pretty. I usually use that song to just introduce myself to the audience, although the patter in between the song is always different.

Theater has to resonate in your heart in a way that movies don't.

Also, if you want to reach people, theatre is not always the best way to do it.

If you deny yourself commitment, what can you do with your life?

Pork was in 1971, and I stopped hanging out at The Factory by like 1973.

I burned out on AIDS and did no AIDS work for a couple of years. I was so angry that people were still getting this disease that nobody can give you - you have to go out and get it!