Maureen O’Hara - biography

“I watch and listen to movies today and am shocked by the way actors deliver their lines.  Everybody mumbles now and I don’t understand why.”

“John Wayne was one of the greatest ambassadors for the United States that ever lived.”

“Speaking as an actress, I wish all actors would be more like Duke Wayne - and speaking as a person, it would be nice if all people could be honest and as genuine as he is.  This is a real man.”

“To the people throughout the world, John Wayne is not just an actor, and a very fine actor - John Wayne is the United States of America.”

“I dainty little lass I wasn’t.  I looked twice my age until I turned 10 or 11.”

“There’s a terrible truth for many women in the picture business: Aging typically takes its toll and means fewer and less desirable roles.”

“I was born into the most remarkable and eccentric family I could possibly have hoped for.”

“Charles Laughton signed me to my first movie contract at 17.  He later asked my parents if he could adopt me.”

“Making movies is just like betting on horses at the racetrack.”

“I spent a great deal of time with Che Guevara while I was in Havana.  I believe he was far less a mercenary than he was a freedom fighter.”

“God has a most wicked sense of humor.”

“I have never lost my faith in God.”

“I’m terrified about the day that I enter the gates of heaven and God says to me, just a minute.”

“When How Green Was My Valley finally wrapped, I thought John Ford was a walking god.”

“After I got to Hollywood, I resented that I didn’t get a crack at more dramatic roles because I photographed so beautifully.”

“As the 1960s began, a new breed of Hollywood leading lady was emerging.  She was elegant, international, and wonderfully comedic.”

“How could you have had such a wonderful life as me if there wasn’t a God directing?”

“I really wanted to be an opera soprano.”

“I am like many of the women I have played onscreen.”

“Above all else, deep in my soul, I’m a tough Irishwoman.”

“Audiences in London called me the girl with the black cherry eyes.”

“Charles Laughton and his wife, Elsa Lanchester, were never blessed with children.  Years after he died, Elsa wrote her autobiography and claimed they never had children because Laughton was homosexual.  That’s rubbish.  Whether or nor Laughton was gay would never have stopped him from having children.  He wanted them too badly.  Laughton told me the reason they never had children was because Elsa couldn’t conceive, the result of a botched abortion she’d had during her earlier days in burlesque.  Laughton told me many times that not being a father was his greatest disappointment in life.”

“Comedy is difficult, especially slapstick.  The trick is to have fun while you are performing it.”

“Every star has that certain something that stands out and compels us to notice them.”

“Henry Fonda gave me a spanking during a scene in Spencer’s Mountain.”

“How could you get angry with Jackie Gleason?”

“I didn’t let anyone push me into things I didn’t want to do where my career was concerned.  So why did I crumble when it came to men?”

“I don’t remember having a crush on a boy when I was a girl.  I don’t even remember my first kiss.”

“I grew up in the theater and danced ballet atrociously.”

“I had always been a tomboy - I still am, at heart.”

“I knew that Jamaica Inn was going to make me a star.”

“I saw myself as Joan of Arc.”

“I’m really honestly terrified about how much I should tell and how much I should still keep secret.”

“In the beginning it was all black and white.”

“John Candy knew he was going to die.  He told me on his 40th birthday.  He said, well, Maureen, I’m on borrowed time.”

“Lost in a crowd of greats, not a single Oscar.  That’s showbiz.”

“My heritage has been my grounding, and it has brought me peace.”

“My whole life was foretold to me.  An old Romany gypsy read my fortune.”

“Some time ago, I told Larry King that I planned to live to be 102.  I still do.”

“The Parent Trap gave my career another boost, starring in family comedies.”

“The Queen Mary was the most civilized and luxurious way one could travel to America in the late 1930s.”

“The depth of John Candy’s talent did surprise me.  He was one of my all-time favorite leading men.”

“The studio thought I was crazy to perform all of my own fencing stunts, but I loved it.”

“When I was young, I was told that I had a sulky, pouty face.”

“When you try to battle with John Ford, you have to give in.”

Maureen O’Hara has appeared in the following films:
Jamaica Inn (1939)
The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1939)
A Bill of Divorcement (1940)
How Green Was My Valley (1941)
Ten Gentlemen from West Point (1942)
The Black Swan (1942)
Immortal Sergeant (1943)
This Land Is Mine (1943)
Buffalo Bill (1944)
The Spanish Main (1945)
Miracle on 34th Street (1947)
Sinbad the Sailor (1947)
The Foxes of Harrow (1947)
Bagdad (1949)
Britannia Mews (1949)
Father Was a Fullback (1949)
Rio Grande (1950)
Flame of Araby (1951)
Against All Flags (1952)
Kangaroo (1952)
The Quiet Man (1952)
Lady Godiva of Coventry (1955)
The Long Gray Line (1955)
The Magnificent Matador (1955)
Lisbon (1956)
The Wings of Eagles (1957)
Our Man in Havana (1959)
Mr. Hobbs Takes a Vacation (1962)
McLintock! (1963)
Spencer’s Mountain (1963)
The Battle of the Villa Fiorita (1965)
The Rare Breed (1966)
Big Jake (1971)
Only the Lonely (1991)