Quotes By Marlee Matlin

The best feeling in the world is when you child just comes up to you and lays their head in your lap, for no other reason but just because.

What the Bleep Do We Know was not written with a deaf person in mind, but when they met me, it clicked with them to have me in it. But that happens with a lot of actors in Hollywood, not just with me.

I can hear you and I can watch your mouth move, and then I put together the sounds and the visual image, and I can understand the words as I integrate the two signals.

At the end of the day, it's about the best interests of the children.

When I was 13, I told Henry Winkler I wanted to act. He said, Do it and don't let anyone stand in your way. His validation just made it all the more true. I haven't stopped thanking him since.

The only thing I can't do is hear. I can drive, I have a life with four kids, I work on TV, I do movies, so the deafness question, is it that they want to know because, what? Not sure.

Looking back now, thinking about that moment in the lights, with my heart pounding, Oscar in my hand, all I can say is I am grateful and humbled - still to this day. Next to marrying my husband and the birth of my children, it is one of the best days ever.

It was my father who instilled the 'never say no' attitude I carry around with me today, and who instilled in me a sense of wonder, always taking us on adventures in the car, never telling us the destination.

All I can say is I've been reading the lips of bleeped-out words, angry baseball players, and stoned-out rock stars on awards shows for years and it's been hilarious. Everyone is always asking me what the bleeped-out parts are saying.

I guess not being able to hear just made me adventurous and daring. And in most cases, that didn't make my parents very happy with me.

By the time I was a teenager, my desire to be daring and taste everything got me in trouble. Too often, I was in the company of kids my parents would call 'wild.'

There is nothing better than being a parent. It is the most challenging job one could ever ask for. I love being a mom and I love being a friend to my children as well.

When you're up for an award at the Oscars, try as you might, it's hard to concentrate on the show.

At some point we have to stop and say, There's Marlee, not, There's the deaf actress.

Hollywood embraced me in the late '80s because there was a good project I was in and it was different. Nowadays, it's about corporate mentality, box office, youth.

Every one of us is different in some way but for those of us who are more 'different,' we have to put more effort into convincing the less different that we can do the same thing as they can... just differently.

Watch me when people say deaf and dumb, or deaf mute, and I give them a look like you might get if you called Denzel Washington the wrong name.

Everybody's got a job to do, and I do mine as best I can.

Differences are scarier now. The dollar isn't so guaranteed if you don't follow what they see as the norm. But I don't moan about it. I just keep working.

Maybe my way of communicating through sign made me more in tune with my body and how it moved. Who knows? I just know when I saw a stage for the first time, I wanted to be on it.

I have made the choices that work best for me. I know I cannot please everyone, and that's fine.

If I were offered a cochlear implant today, I would prefer not to have one. But that's not a statement about hearing aids or cochlear implants. It's about who you are.

I hope that through my example, such as my role on 'The West Wing,' I can help change attitudes on deafness and prove we can really do everything... except hear.

When I was young I knew I was deaf. I couldn't accept it.

I have a great husband, great parents and in-laws, and I have help with a nanny. It's not easy, but there are others who do it every day and don't have a high-profile job as I do.