Quotes from Mariette Hartley

I'm awfully tired of playing grieving people, which seems to have been my bent in the last five years. But it's an important part of my life and if I can express it in any way, I will - including doing seminars.

Our deepest wounds when integrated become our greatest power.

Humility is a very tough thing to have, especially when you're a tough guy.

Film taught me an enormous amount about the internal life a performance has to have, and that life has to be real. You can fake it on stage, but not for the camera.

I think my strength as a performer is my ability to straddle the fence between comedy and tragedy.

But I will say that TV was a great education for me. It allowed me to develop techniques for getting the job done. It's the best training ground since B movies.

My family is really a classy 'Simpsons.'

I'm always in Jamaica in my fantasies. We have a home there, and it's my special spiritual place where I get re-nourished.

I think the reason why 'Star Trek' works so well was its small family feeling. The show felt small, you could see the mistakes, you could see rocks weren't rocks. You caught them at it all the time, but you didn't care because you were so hooked to the people and to the stories. It was a fabulous show.

I didn't know anything about 'Star Trek.' I was doing theater a lot in those days, getting my life together. I didn't watch television. So, to come in on it was a really amazing experience.

I've been keeping journals since I was a kid.

My karma doesn't seem to be a big screen karma: it's definitely a little-screen karma.

I got used to certain things that normal kids don't get used to, like, when my mother went into the kitchen for things other than just cooking. I could hear the bottle open up and I could hear the chugs. Then the next morning, none of it was discussed. You grow up feeling crazy.

It's nice to be thought of as soft and sensual.

Before the Polaroid commercials, my image was that of a solid actress, a theater actress who could do anything. But the Polaroid commercials were high comedy... Through them I was finally noticed as a comedian.

I wanted to put my present joy in the context of all the past pain, to show that there really is light at the end of the tunnel.

It's much easier to do a TV series because an actress can stay put.

Both Mom and Dad were blackout, killer drinkers. Dad came to school football games drunk. I'd find Mom passed out in the bushes, scared and hiding.

I talk only about my journey because that's all I know. That's what the audience always pulls me back to. There's a hunger out there for the spoken journey, just to share the experience, the strength, the hope.

I've never had a homosexual or bisexual experience, but it doesn't make me uncomfortable to dip into those feelings. I think a lot of women have those feelings without acting on them.

I can't lose my spontaneity.

I'm impulsive, spontaneous; I have a joy in my life today that doesn't quit.

Mariette is a nickname. My real name is Mary Loretta.

I had married, had a child. I was content to stay at home. I had let go of the fantasy of stardom.