Quotes by Harvey Fierstein

• Time will tell us what we did and didn't do.
• It's through sheer will that I can sing.
• 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.
• Never be bullied into silence. Never allow yourself to be made a victim. Accept no one's definition of your life; define yourself.
• 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.
• You really, really, really have to love what you are going to do in theatre 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.
• There are times when I don't take roles because I don't want to be perceived a certain way.
• To me, if a heterosexual has a right to do it, then I have a right to do it. And if it's important to the gay youth - who are now setting the agenda - then its important to me.
• To work all the time is to be incredibly lucky.
• Well, I always looked at Mulan as a movie about a lesbian coming out.
• What looks absolutely fabulous in rehearsal can fall flat in front of an audience. The audience dictates what you do or don't change.
• 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.
• You know, I always got offered other stuff. Not the romantic leads, obviously. But very often it's a role that's underwritten, where the character has no personality at all. And they need a character actor who can fill it in.
• It's a lot of fun to play someone you don't normally think of yourself as.
• The world is full of more interesting things than my voice.
• Also, if you want to reach people, theatre is not always the best way to do it.
• Pork was in 1971, and I stopped hanging out at The Factory by like 1973.
• Actually, I think the average voice is like 70 percent tone and 30 percent noise. My voice is 95 percent noise.
• And I believe that you never be limited in what you do, so I like to do movies, I like to do television.
• 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.
• But I'm not adverse to the idea of Torch Song as a musical. It would just be different. Because the play will always be there exactly as it was, and in a musical you could tell a lot of the story through songs.
• How time files when you's doin' all the talking.
• 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.
• I actually pray everyday, but I don't believe in God.
• In London they don't like you if you're still alive.
• I do believe we're all connected. I do believe in positive energy. I do believe in the power of prayer. I do believe in putting good out into the world. And I believe in taking care of each other.
• I got the regular call, that they were doing a Broadway musical of Hairspray, and would I come and audition. I was familiar with the movie, because at the time it came out my lover wrote for Premiere magazine, and we had to see everything.
• 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.
• It would be nice to redefine ourselves - at the moment we are drowning in diversity. That's not a bad thing, its just going to take a while before we refocus.
• If you deny yourself commitment, what can you do with your life?
• A child's kiss is magic. Why else would they be so stingy with them?
• I am thrilled - I can't stress that enough - thrilled when I see kids getting active.
• In Torch Song, I did that character almost non-stop from 1978 until I made the movie in 1987. Then I had some failure, which also colors how you react to doing other things.