Quotes from David Jason

While I'm hale and hearty, I've no thought in my mind to retire.

Some actors retire, and some don't.

My life has been in reverse. It wasn't fame, and it wasn't money, but I always wanted to succeed. The only way I could do that was to try with every job to be better than I was in the last one, and to learn.

When you're young, for God's sake, get out and try everything in terms of a career. Or go abroad, meet people.

My desperation to be on the stage and perform was like a vocation, a religious calling.

One of the reasons that I needed to become an actor was that I didn't have any self-confidence.

I've met a lot of military men in my time. After they retire, they are still extremely game. They dress perfectly and have impeccable manners. They always end up as secretaries of golf clubs. I have great admiration for them.

It seems to me that as soon as politicians get in, they become part of this club, and the rest of us, beneath them, are just ants running about. They become besotted with their position.

My father used to say, 'What the hell are you listening to? Put that bloody rubbish off.' And it was The Beatles.

When I made my first decision, come hell or high water, that I would try to be a professional actor, I was burnt. Emotionally, I was burnt.

It has taken a lot of persuasion for me to take part in an official documentary about 'Only Fools and Horses.' But, as time has gone on, it seems to have been imprinted in television history, and I thought it was only right that I tried to give an accurate insight into how the show was put together.

We get the impression through film and TV that Americans are violent gangsters with guns or upper-middle-class people in romcoms. I really liked the people. They were really warm. They could have been Brits. I mean that in the nicest possible way.

I go with my wife Gill to the supermarket, but not often.

Classic comedy is classic comedy, and it will go on for years.

People tend to feel that if you're a comedian, you can't act.

I was very shy and had low self-esteem; the only way to stop yourself getting beaten up was to turn your hand to being an idiot. At the beginning, it was survival, and after that, it became second nature.

I'm really excited to be bringing back 'Open All Hours.' I am sure there is an audience out there who would like to see what Granville has been getting up to in the corner shop.

John Sullivan's scripts were always very funny, and cast and crew got on well.

I would like 'Frost' to go on forever, but you don't want people in the press hammering you, saying you've outstayed your welcome or that it's not believable anymore.

My mum, Olwen, was a bright and talkative woman who loved a gossip and a story and was given slightly to malapropisms. And she was Welsh, so, of course, she sang.

In 1977, while I was performing in a play in Cardiff, a friend introduced me to a striking redhead called Myfanwy Talog, famed for her appearances on Welsh television with the comedy duo Rees and Ronnie. We were instantly smitten and eventually moved in together, sharing 18 happy years.

You wouldn't want me to play Frost in a wheelchair, would you? 'Frost' is getting a little long in the tooth. I still enjoy doing it, and it's a great part, but I just think he's got to retire.

I'm an actor, and so of course I want to see TV companies making good dramas. I want that to be a priority.

When you see the kids on 'Britain's Got Talent' or 'The X Factor' who just want to be famous at all costs, you just go, 'God, these people just don't know what it is they're asking for.'