287 Quotes by Dick Van Dyke

I wanted to be Stan Laurel, then I wanted to be Fred Astaire and then Captain Kangaroo. I actually started out as a radio announcer when I was 17 and never left the business, so that’s literally 70 years.

I did a ‘Golden Girls’ once, which shot in front of an audience, and that went well. I had a good time. But I need an audience, for comedy at least.

I didn’t know the answers, but I could feel that the things that gave life meaning came from a place within and from the nurturing of values like tolerance, charity, and community.

Rob Petrie is who I really am – in personality and general ineffectiveness.

I think most people will tell you that. They can go along and, while they’re denying that they are addicted, say it’s stress this, it’s this, it’s that. But I – it’s – I think – I really believe there is a gene. Some people become addicted and others don’t.

I wrote a little autobiography about how luck has to do with everything. It’s called ‘My Lucky Life In and Out of Show Business.’ A publisher came to me and said, ‘Write a book,’ so I did. I wanted to call it ‘Everybody Else Has Got a Book.’

I was the class clown, you know, that kind of thing, and I gathered around me a group of guys who also were silly. I was in all the plays and everything. But I don’t know, at that time show businesses looked like the moon, you know, it was so far away. I wanted to be a radio announcer.

Emotionally, I’m about 13.

I’ve retired so many times now it’s getting to be a habit.