Whoopi Goldberg - biography

“An actress can only play a woman.  I’m an actor, I can play anything.”

“I got the killer part, that’s the truth.  It does have Patrick Swayze and Demi Moore but, honey, when I’m on the screen you’ve got to be paying attention!  [On her role in Ghost]”

“Sitting at the table during Color Purple and looking up and suddenly realizing I was acting in front of Steven Spielberg, was pretty cool.  It was pretty good.”

“The art of acting is to be other than what you are.”

“You know, be an actor because you love to act.  Don’t be an actor because you think you’re going to get famous, because that’s luck.”

“For some reason, all artists have self-esteem issues.”

“I am an artist, art has no color and no sex.”

“Things happen to you out of luck, and if you get to stick around it’s because you’re talented.”

“I used my imagination to make the grass whatever color I wanted it to be.”

“That’s the thing about Mother Nature, she really doesn’t care what economic bracket you’re in.”

“I don’t really view Communism as a bad thing.”

“You’ve got to vote for someone.  It’s a shame, but it’s got to be done.”

“It’s being willing to walk away that gives you strength and power - if you’re willing to accept the consequences of doing what you want to do.”

“I am the American Dream.  I am the epitome of what the American Dream basically said.  It said, you could come from anywhere and be anything you want in this country.  That’s exactly what I’ve done.”

“Actors have no colour.  That is the art form.  They ask me all the time: ‘Well, what would you really like to do, Whoopi?’ I say: ‘I wanna do A Lion in Winter.’ They say: ‘But-but-but, Eleanor of Aquitaine was...  y’know...’ I say: ‘Thin?  Old?’ They say: ‘Buy you are, y’know...’ And I say: ‘Thin?  Old?’ ‘No, Whoopi, you are...  black!’ I say: ‘No!’, as if I didn’t know.”

“I’m fighting the label of ‘Black’ actress simply because it’s very limiting in people’s eyes, especially people who are making movies.”

“You can see I’m black.  It’s not something I consciously think about.  It just is.  It’s like having a dick.  You don’t think about having a dick.  You just have one.”

“When I listen to these women, it makes what I thought were my hard knocks feel like little nudges.”

“And I don’t believe that I have to stay on one side of the fence or the other.  I don’t believe that there is any good career move or bad career move.  I believe there are only the things that make me happy.”

“Born ham, that’s basically me.”

“I am where I am because I believe in all possibilities.”

“I don’t have pet peeves, I have whole kennels of irritation.”

“I don’t look like Halle Berry.  But chances are, she’s going to end up looking like me.”

“I grew up in a time when it would never have occurred to anyone to tell me there was anything I couldn’t do.”

“I want Carl Sagan to explain the sky to me.”

“If every American donated five hours a week, it would equal the labor of 20 million full-time volunteers.”

“Normal is in the eye of the beholder.”

“Normal is nothing more than a cycle on a washing machine.”

“We’re here for a reason.  I believe a bit of the reason is to throw little torches out to lead people through the dark.”

“When I started, I knew I didn’t fit any visual that anyone was going to lie down and take their clothes off about.  Work doesn’t come to me; I go out and look for it.”

“When you are kind to someone in trouble, you hope they’ll remember and be kind to someone else.  And it’ll become like a wildfire.”

Whoopi Goldberg has appeared in the following films:
The Color Purple (1985)
Jumpin’ Jack Flash (1986)
Burglar (1987)
Fatal Beauty (1987)
The Telephone (1988)
Beverly Hills Brats (1989)
The Long Walk Home (1990)
Soapdish (1991)
Sister Act (1992)
The Player (1992)
Loaded Weapon 1 (1993)
Naked in New York (1993)
Sister Act 2: Back in the Habit (1993)
Made in America (1993)
Corrina, Corrina (1994)
Star Trek: Generations (1994)
The Lion King (1994)
The Little Rascals (1994)
The Pagemaster (1994)
Boys on the Side (1995)
Moonlight and Valentino (1995)
Bogus (1996)
Bordello of Blood (1996)
The Associate (1996)
Eddie (1996)
Ghosts from the Past (1996)
A Christmas Carol (1997)
Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer: The Movie (1998)
Girl, Interrupted (1999)
The Deep End of the Ocean (1999)
The Adventures of Rocky & Bullwinkle (2000)
More Dogs Than Bones (2000)
Rat Race (2001)
The Hollywood Sign (2001)
Monkeybone (2001)
Pinocchio 3000 (2004)
Racing Stripes (2005)
Everyone’s Hero (2006)
Doogal (2006)
Farce of the Penguins (2006)
If I Had Known I Was a Genius (2007)
For Colored Girls (2010)
A Little Bit of Heaven (2011)
The Little Engine That Could (2011)