Quotes from Jackie Coogan

I never owned a piano and I never had a house full of period furniture.

An actor like me hardly ever sees a producer. My agent will say, how about Coogan for the part. The producer will say yes. So you never see the producer.

There isn't any more real show business.

The pictures I appear in are shown in school rooms all over the country.

Other boys went to see Babe Ruth. Babe Ruth came to see me.

At one time my name was on 50 or 60 different items, from dolls to pencil boxes.

I was blackballed by the studios when I sued by stepfather.

My dad had a good sense about merchandising, and I appeared in all kinds of products from pencil boxes and soap to suits and caps.

When I was making the 'Kid' my salary was $75 a week. Chaplin gave me a $5,000 bonus at the end of the picture.

Working with Chaplin was a marvelous experience.

Chaplin himself was the greatest scene stealer of all time. No matter what was happening Charlie could draw attention to himself - if he wanted to.

Pittsburgh, where you once couldn't wear a shirt for more than an hour, is a lot cleaner than Hollywood.

Being who I was, I had the best swimming instructor - Duke Kahanamoku - the year after he won the Olympics.

When 'The Kid' made its premiere I was so young I fell asleep and never saw the movie.

All it took was one good role to convince producers all over again that I could act.

I don't think its better to grow up normal and get the measles and mumps and have your front teeth knocked out.

I knew San Francisco when it was a wild place during Prohibition. There were more speakeasies than churches, and you could always get a drink.

The trouble was that I tried to prolong my youth.

Fester never talked in the 'Addams Family' cartoons. So I raised my voice an octave and I gave him a beetling look.

It is my intention at all times to see that my mother and my little brother are amply provided for.

I had the flu in New York and pushed the President of the United States off the front pages.

That's what TV has forgotten: how to entertain.

We used Chaplin's formula in all my pictures. Make 'em laugh for five and a half reels, and then make 'em cry in the last half reel. But give 'em a chance to dry their eyes before the lights come up.

San Francisco's my home town, you know.