Andy Garcia

Andy Garcia: My uncle, who was a little more flamboyant, always said the guy who dressed the best was Fred Astaire.

Andy Garcia: We didn't bring much out of Cuba. On the way to the airport they searched you and took everything, and then they put you on a plane.

Andy Garcia: So for directors, actors, producers, writers-whoever encompasses the creative elements of a film - you have a hit, everyone's happy, and you're the hottest thing in the world. But if the movie doesn't open, then those realities do come into play.

Andy Garcia: I'm not the type of person who goes through all this effort for a movie, and then doesn't care if anybody sees it. I want them to see it, and I want them to see it on the big screen.

Andy Garcia: I'm attracted to classical things, not fads. I'm sure everybody has a'70s photograph of himself with a velvet lapel and a wide tie. But I like pieces that have age to them.

Andy Garcia: I was a banquet waiter at the Beverly Hilton hotel. You learn a lot when you're in the service industry - the jerks of the world really come to the fore. It's a valuable learning experience to be in the position where you're of service to someone who sometimes doesn't even know you're there.

Andy Garcia: Children make you a better everything. Daughters open up a whole different sensibility to you. When you have children, it focuses you on them as opposed to on yourself.

Andy Garcia: Becoming a producer enables you to empower yourself, to make the film that you want to make. I have desires to make movies - I have movies I'm developing, and things that I'm interested in.

Andy Garcia: I'm an exile. My father had the courage to leave with his wife, his mother and three children under 12. It took more courage to leave, to sacrifice everything for freedom, than to stay.

Andy Garcia: I never applied to go back to Cuba. They did invite me to the Havana Film Festival, but I am opposed to the regime in Cuba. I'd have liked to go back every day of my life. But in honor of all the people who have died and suffered under that regime, I'm not able to make that leap.

Andy Garcia: They say a lot of women would like to see me naked, but there's not a lens long enough for that.

Andy Garcia: Freedom is not negotiable.

Andy Garcia: You are defined by who are, by your choices in life, in all regards, not just in doing movies.