Alan Alda

… life is meaningless unless you bring meaning to it; … it is up to us to create our own existence.

Unless you do something, unless you make something it's as though you aren't there.

Alan Alda (born Alphonso Joseph D'Abruzzo; January 28, 1936) is an American actor, director, screenwriter, and author. A six-time Emmy Award and Golden Globe Award winner, he is widely known for his roles as Captain Hawkeye Pierce in the TV series M*A*S*H (1972-1983) and Arnold Vinick in The West Wing (2004-2006).

Quotes

• The good thing about being a hypocrite is that you get to keep your values.
  • as interviewed on NPR's Here & Now, "A Conversation with Alan Alda", September 13, 2007.

• My mother didn’t try to stab my father until I was six.
  • in his memoir Never Have Your Dog Stuffed: And Other Things I've Learned, Random House, 2005, ISBN 1400064090.

• … life is meaningless unless you bring meaning to it; … it is up to us to create our own existence. Unless you do something, unless you make something it's as though you aren't there.
  • from Alan Alda's graduation speech, 1980.

• You don't put statistics on trial, you put individuals on trial.
  • From Extended Brains on Trial - Published on Sep 19, 2013

• One of the most basic things I've tried to do is give people a greater understanding of how science works - the importance of evidence, the importance of many trials, of rigorous studies, and the idea that we learn only a little bit at a time. . . . Making people aware of that process helps increase appreciation and respect for science, and that helps us make informed decisions for our families and ourselves.
  • Discussing his efforts hosting Scientific American Frontiers and through other channels to make science more understandable, as quoted in "Alan Alda Wants Us to Communicate: Our favorite TV doctor prescribes laughter as a start" AARP The Magazine. May 27, 2020.

About Alan Alda

• I have a final word of advice to our students. If you work very, very hard, this is the kind of actor, writer and director you may turn out to be, and if you work extra hard, this is the kind of person you may turn out to be.
  • James Lipton from Inside Actor's Studio, season 6 episode 11.

External links

• Alda's motivational graduation speech at Connecticut College