Quotes

[Who said in February 2002, when appearing on the BBC's Shooting Stars]: I've been on some loony shows in my time, but this one takes the cake.

I made money. Enough so I don't have to work again. But I'd like to, I really would. But I'd want to do something interesting like Santa Claus - or God.

Barbara Eden is the most beautiful girl in the world.

I spent five years in England, I went over there with my mother in the show South Pacific and I just love it. I go back there three or four times a year. I joined the American airforce because the Korean war was going on at one time and I got my call up papers and I was supposed to report back to the United States and get my ass shot off in Korea which I didn't think was a smart idea and not only that I couldn't understand what the war was all about, I guess a lot of people could at that time but I still can't even more than I can the Vietnam war, so anyhow I enlisted in the American airforce and I was stationed in London for four years which was pretty good because I never gave up my civilian apartment in St Johns Wood. I got married, met a Swedish girl there, we've been married 46 years now.

[on the infamous "Who Shot J.R?" episode]: "Before that fateful shot rang out, I was merely bemused by the success of the character. Villainy could be fun, and that's how I played it. And if it worked. I mean I couldn't go down to the corner to pick up my copy of the Sunday New York Times without running into some nubile creature with "J.R. for President" emblazoned across her chest. Now a higher, shriller note had been added. People who once merely wanted J.R.'s autograph demanded to know who shot him as if it were their birthright, and were angry and upset when I told them, truthfully, that I didn't know.

I was born with success. Lucky for me I am able to handle it. Also, I damn well deserve it!

People I meet really want me to be J.R., so it's hard to disappoint them.

[About co-star Linda Gray after her real-life divorce]: Maj and I kind of adopted her. She was here at the house nearly every day. We'd call her first thing in the morning to make sure she was alright, we'd make sure she had dinner every night.

[Referring to his choice of final resting place for his ashes] I want to be spread over a field and have marijuana and wheat planted and harvest it in a couple of years and then have a big marijuana cake, enough for 200 or 300 people. People eat a little of Larry.

I'm stronger now than when I started this whole rigamarole. I know I have a nice 36-year-old liver in the body of a 66-year-old man and I feel wonderful.

[In 1998]: We recycle everything else - tires, glass, paper, you name it. Why not recycle our bodies?

[About his lifelong friendship with Carroll O'Connor]: Carroll is really my mentor. He knows more [show business] than any other actor I know.

[In 1965]: I'm the kind of guy who says I am $15 overdrawn at the bank when I have $700 in the account. That's how pessimistic I am. With that in mind, I want to say that I don't know how I Dream of Jeannie can fail.

The time is ripe for a bad guy, and I'm it.

[In 1980]: I've been married 26 years and it lasts because I take my wife with me, wherever I go.

They say it's no worse than standing in front of a TV set. That's what they said about asbestos and World War II radiation experiments.

[If he were to leave Dallas (1978), then Robert Culp would take over his role which would've not upset Hagman]: I'm almost 50. I simply would have gone on to something else. As you get older, you think of things you would like to do. As of now, I've got my toy.

Naw, I asked Walter Cronkite to be vice president. Everybody loves Walter, a lot of people don't like Mr. Nixon and a lot of people don't like Don.

[Who said in 1983 upon meeting with Joan Collins for the first time]: She was the most beautiful women.

[In 1971]: I grew up in a family that had servants, including butlers - I've been around servants all my life - and somehow we got the proper procedures straightened out without calling in an expert.

[on his role of I Dream of Jeannie (1965) that was finally cancelled]: But it spelled trouble. It was hard on me. It hit me like a bang.

[on his popularity while playing the fifty-something brother/villain J.R. Ewing on Dallas (1978)]: Everybody knows a J.R. They have a boss, an uncle, a daddy, a florist who is just like him. And not just in America either. J.R. is all over the world, set aside from others in that he has been trained to succeed at any cost.

[Upon his introduction to marijuana by Jack Nicholson, as a safer alternative to his heavy drinking]: I liked it because it was fun, it made me feel good, and I never had a hangover!

[When he landed the part on I Dream of Jeannie (1965)]: They did the first season in black and white to save $500 a show. I came out; I was out of work. I had done 'The Edge of Night' in New York.

[Who said in 2011 about his stage 2 throat cancer diagnosis]: As J. R. I could get away with anything - bribery, blackmail and adultery. But I got caught by cancer. I do want everyone to know that it is a very common and treatable form of cancer. I will be receiving treatment while working on the new Dallas series. I could not think of a better place to be than working on a show I love, with people I love.

If you do your research on hot springs all over the world, they're usually places of peace. People, even in warring nations and so forth, they'll go and live in peace together around the hot springs, which were always considered medicinal. I firmly believe in water therapy.

[on his book]: I didn't put anything in that I thought I was going to hurt someone or compromise them in anyway, not that I had too many things in my life.

[In 1981]: A year later, when they say they didn't say what they said, I play back the tape.

[From playing the woman's master to playing a dastardly, charming villain]: I was in 'Jeannie' for sometime and I made the transition to a bad guy from a rather bumbling idiot. And I hope that this will be a slightly different edge. At my age, I suppose it's about the last one I'll have an opportunity to do. So, I'm going to have a lot of fun with this.

[In 1989]: By God, you're right, I had not thought of that. It never occurred to me.