Barry Corbin

(About shooting the season finale of Northern Exposure, 3.23 Cicely)
Barry Corbin: They may put me on horseback the whole time, Which would be fine with me.

Barry Corbin: Somewhere in the back of my mind I figured I couldn't compete in films until I was older. At 25, you don't come out and try to replace Walter Brennan.

(About being named after James M. Barrie - Author of Peter Pan)
Barry Corbin: I never could get my mother to tell me why.

(About his character Maurice on Northern Exposure)
Barry Corbin: The only thing Maurice is afraid of is himself, If you took away his shell he'd be a quivering mass of ganglia.

(About his character Maurice on Northern Exposure)
Barry Corbin: As I explored the character I discovered we share almost nothing in common.

(About being without his own horse on the set of Northern Exposure)
Barry Corbin: Kinda like going over to Wimbledon without your tennis shoes or your racket.

Barry Corbin: Maurice is a fascinating character, and the writing managed to stay at a high level most of the time. I was not unhappy I signed that seven-year contract. Anyway, it was nice to have a regular job for a change. That's the upside. The downside is that there was no time to do anything else. I wished I had some time to do other work, but for the most part, I was having a good time.

Barry Corbin: I love doing pilots, but frankly, I'm not that crazy about signing up for series work. What usually happens is that the series ends up repeating what you did in the pilot. That's not only boring but it's artistic suicide. You do the same character over and over again and the perception becomes that's all you can do. Before long, the perception becomes truth. That's all you can do. To prevent that, you'd better be very careful about what seven-year contracts you sign.

Barry Corbin: My mother and about 35 other people watched "Washingtoon" on Showtime! I believe if it had come along a year later during Dan Quayle's term as V.P., it would have had a much better chance. The problem with political satire on TV is that it's too outlandish to be believable or it's surpassed in the morning headlines! Can you imagine satirizing the political shenanigans of 1998? I think the satire is the reality!

Barry Corbin: I'm glad people liked the sparkplug line - I threw that in there because I really had my cousin do that when we were kids. He didn't think it was quite as funny as people did, but now it is forever on film.

Barry Corbin: Back in the early part of the last century life was simpler. We had no such thing as computers and you had to write a letter, put a stamp on it and mail it. Now, you just pluck it out of the ether and it confuses me terminally. If I had to run this computer I'd throw it out the window!

Barry Corbin: Ben Johnson one time told me that "I'm not the best actor in the world, but I am the best Ben Johnson." And so, I kind of go along with him. I may not be the best actor, but I'm the best me that I can be, right now.

Barry Corbin: We still need to feed the public, both physically and intellectually.

Barry Corbin: I think for the last fifteen, twenty years or so, Hollywood has underestimated the appeal of the Western. I think there is still a huge market.

Barry Corbin: Henry Fonda one time said that every time he had a job, he thought it was gonna' be the last one. And, if you got any sense, you gotta' think that because, you know when somebody's gonna do a dip, some of 'em go pretty far down.

Barry Corbin: Gary McMahan wrote the Old Double Diamond and it is the best cowboy song I've ever heard. Not just currently. In my opinion it is the best cowboy song of all time.

Barry Corbin: For an actor, you're rejected eight or ten times a day. All you've got to sell is yourself. You're not selling products, they're not turning down a car, they're turning you down. Most people can't handle that. Most people are essentially not set up that way.