I wanted to be with the kind of people Id grown up with, but you cant go back to them and be one of them again, no matter how hard you try. – Ethel Waters
Elia Kazan understood my problems. He was able to bring out the very best in me. He gave me credit for my intelligence. – Ethel Waters
In her whole life Mom never earned more than five or six dollars a week. Being without a husband, it was hard for her to find any place at all for us to live. – Ethel Waters
I had always loved John Fords pictures. And I came to love him, too, but I was frightened to death working for him. He used the shock treatment while directing me. – Ethel Waters
Well, the teacher I studied with for nineteen and a half years was a man named Paul Gavert. He was a great lieder singer, so basically Im a trained lieder singer because of that teacher. The teacher I currently study with – since 1995 – is Joan Lader, who also studied with Gavert. – Betty Buckley