Nobody on this earth has the right to tell anyone that their love for another human being is morally wrong.
— Barbra Streisand
I love things that are indescribable, like the taste of an avocado or the smell of a gardenia.
I hear these melodies. I hear horn lines and string lines. That's what's fun about recording with an orchestra.
I have one son. Of everything I've done in my life, nothing matches the feeling of having life growing inside you.
I do have friends that are Republicans, and we have very spirited conversations on a whole range of issues. I am often baffled by why they are Republicans, but I enjoy the dialogue and can move beyond politics to find common ground in my personal relationships.
I got sent to a health camp when I was about 6 years old, and we all had to wear the same starchy blue uniform. The lady who took care of me after school knit me a burgundy sweater. It was the only thing that gave me any individuality.
My nose was part of my heritage, and if I had talent to sing and to act, why wasn't that enough?
I started going to acting school when I was 14, and I would always have my own take on things.
I like simple things. Elastic waists, so I can eat.
Sometimes you resent the people you love and need the most. Love is so fascinating in all its forms, and I think everyone who has ever been a mother will relate to this.
Directing is so interesting. You know, it just sort of encompasses everything that you see, that you know, that you've felt, that you have observed.
If I hear a record once, I usually never listen to it again. I rarely listen to music - unless it's Billie Holiday.
When I sing, people shut up.
I just became a singer, because I could never get work as an actress.
I always wear the same thing at home. I can't be bothered with jewelry. My pants have elastic waists. I like to be comfortable. There are so many more important things to worry about.
I was raised on the streets, in hot, steamy Brooklyn, with stifled air.
I'm interested in the truth, and unauthorized biographies are not. Yes, I would like to correct those errors someday.
I only began to sing because I couldn't get a job as an actress.
When I was a teenager in New York, I was buying antique clothes. I still am.
I don't read music. Not even essentially. Not even nonessentially.
I've always liked working really hard and then doing nothing in particular. So, consequently, I didn't overexpose myself; I guess I maintained a kind of mystery. I wasn't ambitious.
On a very basic level, many people think celebrities have too much already, so we shouldn't be entitled to our political opinions.
Doubt can motivate you, so don't be afraid of it. Confidence and doubt are at two ends of the scale, and you need both. They balance each other out.
My mother told me I should be a secretary, but I wanted to be an actress from when I was very young.
I guess if you have an original take on life, or something about you is original, you don't have to study people who came before you. You don't have to mimic anybody. You just have a gut feeling inside, an instinct that tells you what's right for you, and you can't do it in any other way.
I love road trips! My husband and I love that. We bought a truck with a bench seat so we could put the dog in the middle.
I like to stay home a lot. I like to do other things too, like decorate or build.
I think when I was younger, I wanted to be a star, until I became a star, and then it's a lot of work. It's work to be a star. I don't enjoy the stardom part. I only enjoy the creative process.
When they tried me out as a host on TV, I found that I just couldn't be that gregarious person. I was stranger than that.
My mother never really thought I could become anything.
I never sing in the shower either.
I was kind of a wild child. I wasn't taught the niceties of life.
I need instant gratification.
I still like my antique clothes.
I'll see a celadon green room in an 18th century New Hampshire house and just fall in love. Colors stay in my head.
Eighteenth century American furniture and the design of the architects Greene and Greene are my special love.
I remember when I was 5 living on Pulaski Street in Brooklyn, the hallway of our building had a brass banister and a great sound, a great echo system. I used to sing in the hallway.
Issues of foreign policy have a place in every election for President.
Being a woman in music was fine, but when I wanted to direct, I was poking my head into a man's world.
As a young woman, I wanted nothing more than to see my name in lights.
In the music business, we all do different things, but we sit there and admire other people who can write a song differently or sing differently. It's not so competitive.
It is sort of boring to stay in the same spot. You know, I didn't set out to become the first to do this, the first to do that. It was just that my interests were so diversified.
When I was working a lot, I felt guilty as a parent. I couldn't pick up my son every day from school, bake him cookies and that kind of thing.
My mother had a great voice. Not like mine, not like my sister's, not like my son's - a high soprano voice, but like a bird. I mean, really beautiful.
When I was maybe 5 or 6 years old, the neighborhood girls would sit on the stoop and sing. I was known as the kid who had a good voice and no father.
It always gave me the creeps when I saw performers who desperately wanted the audience to like them. That's not what I'm about.
I'm a work in progress.
My friend Quincy Jones says we won our first Grammys together in 1963. I have no recollection. I don't even remember the room. When he showed me the picture, I remembered what I wore. But it's like awards don't mean anything.
There's a part of you that always remains a child, no matter how mature you get, how sophisticated or weary.
I also have intense relationships with furniture... probably because we practically had none when I was growing up.
