"I could never hold a job for more than three months, which works out well because that's how long a movie shoots"
About this Quote
The subtext is a quiet defense of a profession that still gets side-eyed as unserious work. Acting looks glamorous from the outside, but the labor reality is episodic, contingent, and often precarious. Quaid's line collapses that anxiety into self-deprecation, a way of saying: yes, this is unstable, but the instability is the point. You're not meant to settle in; you're meant to arrive, become someone else on command, then disappear.
There's also a cultural nod to Hollywood's mythos: the actor as the charming drifter, allergic to 9-to-5 life, saved by the very machine that thrives on novelty and churn. Quaid isn't claiming discipline so much as claiming fit. In a world that treats consistency as moral virtue, he celebrates a career that rewards the opposite - and makes you laugh before you can judge it.
Quote Details
| Topic | Career |
|---|---|
| Source | Help us find the source |
| Cite | Cite this Quote |
Citation Formats
APA Style (7th ed.)
Quaid, Dennis. (2026, January 16). I could never hold a job for more than three months, which works out well because that's how long a movie shoots. FixQuotes. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/i-could-never-hold-a-job-for-more-than-three-117279/
Chicago Style
Quaid, Dennis. "I could never hold a job for more than three months, which works out well because that's how long a movie shoots." FixQuotes. January 16, 2026. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/i-could-never-hold-a-job-for-more-than-three-117279/.
MLA Style (9th ed.)
"I could never hold a job for more than three months, which works out well because that's how long a movie shoots." FixQuotes, 16 Jan. 2026, https://fixquotes.com/quotes/i-could-never-hold-a-job-for-more-than-three-117279/. Accessed 3 Feb. 2026.

