Ricky Schroder Quotes

I met the Queen, the Pope, and we went all over Europe and Asia. I just wish I was older when I did all this. Then I could appreciate it more.

I never cared about money because I never needed money, you know what I mean? When I was 12 to 17 I never saw any of the money, so the money never motivated me.

I've been very blessed. My parents always told me I could be anything I wanted. When you grow up in a household like that, you learn to believe in yourself.

If the Indian people want stories written about themselves, how they want them told, they are going to have to make them, they're going to have to finance them. If you let Hollywood do it, Hollywood is going to get it wrong most of the time.

I spent my whole childhood wishing I were older and now I'm spending my adulthood wishing I were younger.

I have fond memories of my childhood. I spent five wonderful years on a popular TV show, but I didn't have a normal childhood. I was tutored for grades 4-11.

Working on 'NYPD Blue' and '24', those two series, I did full runs on those. It's great work, but everything has to align. The producers have to want you; the network has to want you; there has to be great writing; and it's not as easy as it may appear to the outsiders to make all those things align.

I was married at 20 and had a baby by 21. I had to grow up fast. Luckily there were people who believed in me and there were always jobs when I needed one.

I did a lot of gasoline commercials - Hess, Texaco. I was part of the family in the car, the little brat in the back.

I've found joy, peace and perspective. Those are very good things to have.

Directing, I just feel comfortable. I know what I want. I know what I want from my crew. I lead by example. I have limitless energy as a director.

There are always moments of despair when you get close to jobs and lose them at the last second. It feels like getting punched in the stomach. You feel like, 'Why do I do this?' Then you go to bed, get up the next day and forget about it.

Westerns are fun. I wish more of them would be made. When you're out there on a set, carrying a gun, riding a horse, you kind of get lost in that make believe world.

There have been times I almost got a persecution complex. I felt like people wouldn't let me grow up. They always saw me as a smiling kid or goofy teenager, no matter how much I'd changed.

I'm very loving and supporting of my actors. I also expect them to show up prepared, happy to be there, and give their all as I do as an actor.

I didn't take the reins of my career until I was about 21, and I've been in charge since then.

I have a real eclectic taste for work, for movies, for characters and jobs.

In the John Wayne movies, the Indians were savages that were trying to scalp you. That culture has really suffered because of the stereotype you see in those westerns.

I think that if there's some innovative entrepreneurs out there who can help teach people how they can cost-effectively help themselves and their planet, I think everybody would be for it. That's going to be the challenge - figuring a way to get the marketplace and commerce to teach us consumers another way.

I demand excellence from the people I work with.

My sympathies go out to the young performers today because they are under a microscope in a way I wasn't. Now everybody's got a camera phone and can record at will or take pictures of you. It's just a different world. I don't know how I would have fared back then.

My daughter's wanted to be an actress since she was six years old, but I didn't want her to go through the same experiences as I did as a child actor.

I was very outgoing, and a good-looking kid. I started doing all the catalogs. I made 60 commercials by the time I was 6. I must have been a natural, because I never took an acting lesson.

I asked Michael Jackson once. I said to him, 'How were you able to go from the Jackson Five to the biggest star in the world? What was your secret, Michael?' He said, 'Ricky, stay inspired. That's the hardest thing to do. If you can figure out a way to stay inspired, you can make it.'

I'm just not a quitter and I just never, ever give up. I was forced to adapt because if I didn't, I was losing inspiration only doing what I was doing.

I think one of the things that saved me is that I never put all my eggs in one basket.

I love horror. I love 'The Shining,' 'Friday the 13th,' 'Halloween,' all those kinds of things. I love zombies, especially '28 Days Later' and '28 Weeks Later,' where the zombies are going faster than the George Romero ones. I love being scared; there's something that's awesome about your heart rate going up like that.

I always thought I had a problem socially, because I was pulled out of school so early. I had a tough time talking to other kids and being comfortable with them.

I didn't grow up around wild horses, no. But I've appreciated their beauty and their power ever since I can remember.

I don't have an iPod. I mean, I have a couple. Doesn't everyone? But I don't use it. I need to because I go to the gym now, and I'm tired of listening to morning radio. I want some music! I do have a video iPod, but I don't use it either.

I have a great family myself so I know if you don't have a family you've got nothing. Nothing else can take the place of the family - not girlfriends or a career.

There were always moments where I'd say, 'What else can I do with my life?' But when I was 30 years old and discovered I could write - I wrote 'Black Cloud' in six weeks - it opened up a whole new world for me.

There's some things that you're passionate about as a director. You just know it has to be a certain way. The challenge is resolving those so everyone is happy and no one feels that they have not been heard.

There are going to be peaks and valleys in everything - in your marriage, in your job, in your life. So just enjoy the peaks and ride out the valleys. Just try not to do anything too rash.

An actor is like an instrument, tune them, play them the right way.

I think my family's watched me over the years in my career, in my pursuit of my career, and they've seen the challenges and the struggles that come with being an actor, with being a writer and a director, and the challenges of morphing my career in from just being an actor into a writer/director.

I love being on set, because I've basically grown up on a set. And now I love to contribute as a director and help steer the ship, if you will.

I play a lot of chess. I probably played 200 games while we were making 'Andromeda.'

A horrible script 99 percent of the time means a horrible movie. But if you start with a good script, odds are you're going to have a good movie.

You always hear about people going through miscarriages and you never understand what one is like unless you go through it.

I'm really into sci-fi. The reason I'm an actor is because of 'Star Wars' - I saw that and I knew that's what I wanted to do. But most of the projects I'm offered as an actor are straightforward dramas, so I haven't really been given a chance to do that kind of role.

Nashville feels like a big little town to me. It's got lots of culture and lots of interesting things to do and lots of interesting people. At the same time, it feels very small and tight-knit and very close. Everyone feels like they know each other.

My career was full of struggles and dreams, disappointments and peaks and valleys. But there was no Twitter, no Facebook or TMZ. Young actors could make mistakes and not become the focus of tabloids.