"But I did an awful lot of work in Hollywood, and in New York for that matter"
About this Quote
Hollywood and New York arent just locations here. They are competing ideas of legitimacy. Hollywood implies scale, industry, the camera machine. New York suggests theater, seriousness, craft, the harder-to-fake aura of "real acting". By adding "for that matter", Macnee widens the frame as if the distinction barely matters, which is precisely the point: he belongs in both ecosystems. Its a way of sidestepping the old binary that treats film as glamour and stage as virtue.
The specific intent feels defensive in the way older performers often get when their careers are flattened into a single iconic image. Macnee, best known for The Avengers, spent years being remembered as a type: suave, ironic, elegantly expendable. This line pushes back against that reduction. The subtext is: dont confuse recognizability with the sum of the work. In an industry that loves origin stories and breakout moments, he insists on the unromantic truth that a career is mostly repetition, travel, and taking the next job.
Quote Details
| Topic | Work |
|---|---|
| Source | Help us find the source |
| Cite |
Citation Formats
APA Style (7th ed.)
Macnee, Patrick. (2026, January 16). But I did an awful lot of work in Hollywood, and in New York for that matter. FixQuotes. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/but-i-did-an-awful-lot-of-work-in-hollywood-and-113102/
Chicago Style
Macnee, Patrick. "But I did an awful lot of work in Hollywood, and in New York for that matter." FixQuotes. January 16, 2026. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/but-i-did-an-awful-lot-of-work-in-hollywood-and-113102/.
MLA Style (9th ed.)
"But I did an awful lot of work in Hollywood, and in New York for that matter." FixQuotes, 16 Jan. 2026, https://fixquotes.com/quotes/but-i-did-an-awful-lot-of-work-in-hollywood-and-113102/. Accessed 13 Feb. 2026.


