Quotes About MGM

Fact is, awards shows were never really about recognizing achievement. They were a publicity ploy cooked up in the late 1920s by MGM topper Louie Mayer and his newly formed Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences which was itself, back in the day, nothing but a front organization to discourage unionizing.

When you worked in a studio it was the studio system that you kind of missed because it was a big, big family. I mean MGM had 5,000 people working a day there. You miss it.

Koverman is one of my favorite Hollywood characters because she was the brains of MGM, and not many people know about her.

To MGM fell the thankless task of policing the Garbo name and its commercial use. Several years earlier, J. Robert Rubin in MGM's New York office was panicked to learn of a trademarked product called Garbo - which turned out to be a new fangled garbage unit. The final cable from headquarters in Culver City concluded, 'It would be fairly hard to stop the word Garbo in connection with a refuse container. It does not seem anyone is going to confuse the two.

My first day at MGM they decided to bring this lion out, male, and it was not the best time for him to see me. All of a sudden he thought I was in heat and this lion went into the dressing room, which was just a trailer on the sound stage, and went crazy.

I love pre-code movies. Some of my favorites are movies with Warren William and there is an MGM film called "Skyscraper Souls" which is the best Warner Brothers movie that MGM ever made.

Herb Solo at that time was the head of MGM. I said, 'I want to live like Clint Eastwood.' Did I know at that time Clint Eastwood, to him, Heaven was a truck, a dog, and a picnic basket for food or something?

When we were at MGM, we never did much about merchandise tie-ups There were too many executives and lawyers to go through.

Lana Turner and Ava Gardner were my special friends at MGM.

We did the original 'Stargate' as an independent movie. It was a surprise success. Shortly before the movie came out, the financiers who were frightened the movie might not do well sold the film to MGM. When the film came out, it was a hit and spawned TV shows.

All the training at MGM came to be a great help for me on 'Molly Brown.'

At MGM, you knew you were going to be working next year; you knew you were going to get paid. But I was too ambitious musically to settle for it. And I wanted to gamble with whatever talent I might have had.

The reason that MGM hired Bobby for Our Gang was that they could look at him and say, cry, and he'd cry, and not many kids can do that unless they really want to cry.

Under no circumstances would it be right for me to go with MGM. Irene shares my opinion.

after a luncheon party with Clark Gable, Spencer Tracy, Luise Rainer, Greta Garbo, and two producers—"I think it was a psychological test to see how I would act"—Knopf offered O'Brien work as MGM's "European Scenario Editor.

My parents were big movie-musical fans. And I thought 'Grease' was different from the usual MGM musical. I was intrigued and fell in love with it.

Bobby [Fosse] was very difficult to work with, he wanted to be a big star at MGM, but it was the end of making musical movies at the time.

Among the great glories of the MGM lot were the vast outdoor sets that had been constructed over the years.

I worked with so many comedians who became big names - so many, I can't even remember some of their names. John Byner, Totie Fields, Joan Rivers. Shecky Green at the MGM. When I started my career, my first hotel in Las Vegas was at the old Flamingo. My opening act was Bill Cosby.

There was no studio involved when we made 'Stargate.' It was financed through Le Studio Canal+ in France and, after the film was finished, it was sold to MGM. When the film was a success, MGM decided to do a television series based on the movie.

This was the heyday of the movies; it was hard to keep a level head and one's sense of values. MGM made over-worked, spoiled idols out of Judy Garland, Mickey Rooney, and Elizabeth Taylor; it wasn't the kids' fault, nor the studio's, it was the System. I too was on the spoiling list for a while, but I didn't go along with it.