Quotes by Sophia Loren

I'm an actress. It's my passion. It's -- I've always lived for acting.

I always try to have a vacation.

I am against all war.

I'm sick when I don't work for year or two.

Sex is like washing your face just something you do because you have to. Sex without love is absolutely ridiculous. Sex follows love, it never precedes it.

You really have to be satisfied with what you are and accept from life what it still very generously offers you -- and notice it, and be glad for it.

A woman's dress should be a like a barbed-wire fence: serving its purpose without obstructing the view.

I'm an actress. It's my passion.

I think for the women of today, because we work and go around a lot, Armani is ideal -- simple and elegant at the same time. It's not eccentric, and everything he does is very subtle. For the evening, I like Gianfranco Ferre. There's a lot of fantasy and creativity in his clothes.

Many people think they want things, but they don't really have the strength, the discipline. They are weak. I believe that you get what you want if you want it badly enough.

I don't believe in anti-aging creams. I believe the skin should be clean, should be nourished, but most of all you should eat the right things.

The eyes of a woman who never cried can not be beautiful.

I was so skinny, they gave me the nickname stechetto -- the stick. I was tall, thin, ugly and dark like an Arab girl. I looked strange. All eyes. No flesh on my bones.

If you are a professional actor who has pride in his work, then the judgment of your peers should be important to you. I treasure each and every award I have ever received -- and my Oscar is in a place of honor.

My philosophy is that it's better to explore life and make mistakes than to play it safe and not to explore at all.

I eat a lot of salad, a little meat, and some fruit--that's all. But I like sweets.

I don't go for films that exalt violence. I don't want them in my house. Sometimes my children see them. But nowadays they do it so truthfully and with so much passion that you are shocked.

Be careful about what you eat because otherwise you get fat! Do you like to be fat? Eat very, very, very little things. Almost starve, but I don't starve, because I eat very much.

I can't tell you that I like getting older, but I think I can cope with it because everybody gets older. Sometimes it's a little upsetting because time goes by and you want to do more and you have to accept life for what it is and find some new motivation that gives you drive and enthusiasm.

I think, in our life I think that when you are an actor, when you are a producer, you have to be very discreet about your personal life, and you have to be closed in, in harmony and in affection and in everything.

I think the quality of sexiness comes from within.

For me, it is good to be vulnerable. It makes me nice... weak sometimes, but in a good way, not a tragic way.

Cooking is an act of love, a gift, a way of sharing with others the little secrets -- 'piccoli segreti' -- that are simmering on the burners.

When I'm walking along in the street, I always feel that around the corner,there is something wonderful waiting for me. That's my attitude.

I don't like to run. I don't like to jump up and down. Being a big girl and having a bosom, I injure myself! It upsets me, I have to hold my two things. I just can't jog, there's something in the way.

Good food is a celebration of life.

Be honest about what you can get. To make a sacrifice and to get what you want you need to be very certain. In other words: always think about your objective, have a clear goal and commit to it from the heart.

The facts of life are that a child who has seen war cannot be compared with a child who doesn't know what war is except from television.

The Fountain of Youth is in your mind.

Getting ahead in a difficult profession requires avid faith in yourself.

I have no regrets. regret only makes wrinkles.

If you don't have the roots somewhere, it's very difficult for people to work with you. Because you are a different person from them. They don't know you, really. They don't know how you feel.

Isn't it wonderful to be alive? You know, you can forget all about it. Then suddenly you remember, and think of all the things you can do. Here I am. I can walk around. I can talk. I can see things and remember things. I am alive. How wonderful!

I'd much rather eat pasta and drink wine than be a size 0.

I have to say that since my mother died, I am not the same person anymore. My life has changed a great deal because it's really unbearable to think you can't see her anymore or talk to her anymore.

Everything you live through helps to make you the person you are now.

I work when I feel like I can do something that pleases me, that I think I can give a little more than I've given up to yesterday.

Physical exercise makes you more graceful. After some gymnasitics you walk as if the whole street is yours.

Success, I would find out, is interior. It has to do with self-fulfillment and the joy of living.

You must all, somewhere deep in your hearts, believe that you have a special beauty that is like no other and that is so valuable that you must not abandon it. Indeed, you must learn to cherish it.

I do 45 minutes a day of stretching and abdominals and I lift light weights of half a kilo. Otherwise, if you strain your muscles, then you have to be quiet and stay without any exercise for a long time. I do heavier weights gradually. I'm going to become Superwoman with oil on my muscles!

My mother taught me the most important principles, to be determined in life, to be disciplined, to be able to understand that there are some things that you can't do and other things you have to do, that you always have to be surrounded by love, that you have to be understanding.

And as I walk round the park I always think, 'Maybe round the corner I am going to find something beautiful.' I always think positively. It is very rare that you find me in a mood that is sad or melancholic.

When you find yourself a mom, you will be by no means seriously by itself with your ideas. A mother usually should think twice, once for herself and once for her boy or girl.

A mother always thinks twice: for herself and for the child.

My mother was so beautiful, she really was a a wonderful person. Always walking like a queen. Like she owned the world. Maybe I took something from her.

It's necessary to have an energy that carries you forward. You need the will to live, to have a great curiosity. To look for the best in life, to find new interests.

You do not become a star, you are born a star. A star is born with that indefinable extra something.

Mistakes are the price of an interesting life.

Transformation is something I cannot explain -- too much analysis might destroy it.

When I was a child, fear was common to my life -- fear of having nothing to eat, fear of the other children taunting me at school because I was illegitimate, and particularly fear of the big bombers appearing overhead and dropping their lethal bursts from the sky.

I exist only because inside of me and above all else I am only and above all a Neapolitan. Naples exists inside of me, and always will. Fortunately for me there is this treasure that I have inside of me and, when I need it, then I pull it out.

You cannot say, because I am from Naples so I like the mixture of drama and comedy all together.

I don't like to go in places where women talk and gossip. The atmosphere I don't like, even though you can sometimes meet nice people. For me, it's a waste of time.

No press conference announcing a last film. I'd just steal away. Best way because, if by chance after two or three years something interesting comes up, I would not -- like Sinatra -- have to say: 'Well, I've thought it over and decided to come back.'

At this moment, everyone is in crisis, not only in Italy but all over Europe. Only in America do they make films that are successful all over the world. In Europe, production is quite poor. We have three or four or five films, which is not enough.

The mirror of your health is your skin. If you drink, it shows in your face; if you eat the wrong foods, you have pimples. If you take care of your food and you lead a healthy life, your skin will look wonderful.

I like to cook for my friends. It is an act of love because in cooking you can create so many plates and recipes, if you know how to -- otherwise you make a mess -- but I like it because it's like a ceremony. You cook for your friends and after, you drink wine and play cards.

If you can learn to use your mind as well as your powder puff, you will become more truly beautiful.

I wake up very early every morning and I have my coffee at 6:30. If it comes at 6:35, I'm very upset. I don't say anything but I'm upset because I'm so punctual in doing things, that if I lose five minutes I have to rush everything.

Show business is what I do, not what I am.

I'm a very shy person, and I never tried to do theater. I've been asked many, many times by the most incredible authors in America to do theater. And I always said no, not knowing what it is to be on the stage and to do theater.

I'm very susceptible to sex appeal.

I believe that rewards in life are deserved. Every reward is the fruit of discipline, of dedication and of sacrifices. And of stubbornness.

Though poor and anxious to work, I refused to alter anything. They would take me as I looked or not at all.... Eventually I profited by looking like myself and not like what was fashionable years ago with certain film technicians in Rome.

The right hairstyle can make a plain woman beautiful and a beautiful woman unforgettable.

I was born wise. Street-wise, people-wise, self-wise. This wisdom was my birthright.

There is no greater love potion than regular coffee, brewed his own. When a man tries it, he was not going anywhere.

The most indespensible ingredient of all good home cooking: love for those you are cooking for.

Being beautiful can never hurt, but you have to have more. You have to sparkle, you have to be fun, you have to make your brain work if you have one.

Any woman can look her best if she feels good in her skin. It's not a question of clothes or makeup. It's how she sparkles.

The first woman was created from the rib of a man. She was not made from his head to top him, nor from his feet to be trampled on by him, but out of his side to be equal to him.

I'm not talking so much about sex -- after you've seen sex in a picture, what else can happen -- but violence is very bad. People think these are things you are allowed to do. I think they should be forbidden.

Learn to use your brains as deftly as your powder box, and then, perhaps, powder box you will not need ... Know smart women men say beautiful -- eyes snatched from the crowd and do not forget just charming.

There is a fountain of youth: it is your mind, your talents, the creativity you bring to your life and the lives of the people you love. When you learn to tap this source, you will truly have defeated age.

Is my mother my friend? I would have to say, first of all she is my Mother, with a capital 'M'; she's something sacred to me. I love her dearly...yes, she is also a good friend, someone I can talk openly with if I want to.

A mother has to think twice, once for herself and once for her child.

Sex appeal is 50% what you've got and 50% what people think you've got.

Jealousy is a miserable feeling. It means you aspire to something that you cannot have.

Nothing makes a woman more beautiful than the belief that she is beautiful.

It's a mistake to think that once you're done with school you need never learn anything new.

No press conference announcing a last film. I'd just steal away. Best way because, if by chance after two or three years something interesting comes up, I would not -- like Sinatra -- have to say: Well, I've thought it over and decided to come back.

I'm a giraffe. I even walk like a giraffe with a long neck and legs. It's a pretty dumb animal, mind you.

It is a great advantage for a system of philosophy to be substantially true.

When you are a mother, you are never really alone in your thoughts. A mother always has to think twice, once for herself and once for her child.

Mistakes are part of the dues one pays for a full life.

There is a Fountain of Youth: It is your mind, your talents, the creativity you bring to your life and the lives of the people you love. When you learn to tap this source, you will truly have defeated age.

I'm a very shy person and I never tried to do theater.

Sex appeal is fifty percent what you've got and fifty percent what people think you've got.

There's no pleasure in working if you don't do the things you want to do.

Mistakes are a part of the dues one pays for a full life.

You have to be born a sex symbol. You don't become one. If you're born with it, you'll have it even when you're 100 years old.

If you haven't cried, your eyes can't be beautiful.