I grew up in an Irish Catholic family, and I think they force you to watch every James Cagney movie.
A James Cagney love scene is one where he lets the other guy live.
I don't think I was ever as fascinated or have had so much respect for anybody like James Cagney.
The great privilege it has been to work with some of the most talented people on the face of the earth. My first scene in a movie was with James Cagney, for goodness sakes. There I was, just out of the U.S. Navy without an acting lesson to my name.
In the movies, Bette Davis lights two cigarettes and hands the second one to James Cagney. It was just so glamorous and romantic.
James Cagney as a baby is not my ideal thing.
Believe it or not, but 'White Heat' and 'Little Caesar' keep dancing around in my brainpan while I'm writing 'Moonshine.'
Roles constantly have to be redefined in any form of entertainment. Look back at the gangster pics of the 1930s and 1940s and the way James Cagney or Humphrey Bogart would play the part. These roles were redefined in the 1970s by Al Pacino and Rober DeNiro. And again in the 1990s by Gary Oldman and Anthony Hopkins.
