I always felt that if I made a movie, it would be one movie; I didn't see how they could make 26 swimming movies.
I have the opportunity to be part of swimming history. To take the sport to a new level would be an honor for me. There's no better time to try this than now.
When I played Gollum in 'Lord of the Rings,' if I was climbing up the side of a mountain, which I physically did, you know, I was on every single occasion swimming through streams, all of that, that wasn't captured. That was filmed on 35 millimeter, and for certain of those shots, it was rotoscoped and painted over.
Kneeling on the sea bottom in a place known as Tiger Beach, I watched a 12-foot- long female tiger shark cruise over the turtle grass with three silver bar jacks swimming in front of her nose.
Well, we've made some changes on this tour. We're no longer sleeping in the parking lots and swimming in the fountains. We've been staying in hotels most of the way, though I will say some hotels have declined to take us because we're just having too much fun.
In Libya, I did well at school because I was clever. In Egyptian public school, I got the highest marks for the basest of reasons. And in the American school, I struggled. Everything - mathematics, the sciences, pottery, swimming - had to be conducted in a language I hardly knew and that was neither spoken in the streets nor at home.
As for swimming, I'm now in the pool 5 days a week from 8 to 10 a.m. And I'm in the gym for an hour and a half, 4 days a week. Two days upper body, two days lower.
The difference between the swimming marathon and the pool events is mainly down to the weather. Nature always gives us external factors to deal with.
Handball, swimming, running, jumping, basketball, and boxing were as much a part of me as breathing.
Water for me is so essential, like swimming.
I guess it turns out choosing your life partner from a group of men trying to get their break in show business by sitting around shirtless in a swimming pool while cameras watch around the clock isn't the path to a soulmate after all.
Within our culture, every school has a swimming pool. We lived on the coast. People swam in the surf. It's a very sporty nation and at that particular time anyone who had an artistic bent was very much an outsider. So if you liked reading or ideas or playing the piano then your dad viewed you as a sissy, basically.
I love The Inn at Palmetto Bluff, an Auberge Property in Bluffton, South Carolina. It's a spectacular corner of the world, with massive old trees lined with Spanish moss, and alligators swimming in the river.
I could see myself still swimming because I'm really enjoying the sport. But at the same time I have this biological clock that is ticking.
Let me pose you a question. Can farm-raised salmon be organic when its feed has nothing to do with its natural diet, even if the feed itself is supposedly organic, and the fish themselves are packed tightly in pens, swimming in their own filth?
I try to do something every day. I lift weights at least three to four days per week, and I'll intersperse that with cardio. For example, on Tuesdays and Thursdays, I'll run and do heavy lifting, and on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, I'll spend two hours lifting weights, as well as something like swimming.
There's no one here in America swimming the Pacific Ocean - or the Atlantic, or the Caribbean - to leave this place. The reason why is because of the freedom. Freedom for a man to mark out his own destiny. It's not, 'Hey, you have so much.'
Do activities you're passionate about - which make your heart and soul feel perky - including things like working out, cooking, painting, writing, yoga, hiking, walking, swimming, being in nature, being around art, or reading inspiring books.
I've never won many awards, I didn't get certificates for swimming or anything.
When I was a child, our summer days were spent swimming; chlorine in my hair was like perfume to me.
Finding original source material is not easy, but when something special like 'Edge of Tomorrow' comes along, everybody recognized it. I wasn't swimming against the stream. Warner Brothers immediately supported it, Tom Cruise signed on instantly; Emily Blunt, who was our first choice, signed on immediately.
Somebody said to me, 'But the Beatles were anti-materialistic.' That's a huge myth. John and I literally used to sit down and say, 'Now, let's write a swimming pool.'
This house was our dream-the gardens, the study, even the swimming pool. Even though I can't see John when I wake up in the morning, I can always feel him here with me.
Growing up, I looked up to major league baseball players, and now these young women have amazing, incredible women all across the board, from swimming to gymnastics to softball to basketball.
I've grown up by the beach all my life, and I almost get anxiety if I haven't been swimming for a couple weeks or a month. It kind of builds up, so I try and get out as much as possible.
I think I'd struggle to get excited by synchronised swimming.
I was 15, and the years of hard swimming had packed muscle on my frame and made me very strong. Not as strong as a football player, but strong enough to inflict heavy damage.
When people ask me what I do, strangers on a plane, perhaps, I tell them that I think. Thinking is excellent exercise, as much as swimming or jogging.
You have to do what the market requires of you... You either keep swimming, or you sink.
Swimming upstream in the music business is a hard thing to do.
I have often wanted to drown my troubles, but I can't get my wife to go swimming.
Swimming has been a very effective medium for telling a story about the state of our planet.
If I could get any animal it would be a dolphin. I want one so bad. Me and my mom went swimming with dolphins and I was like, 'How do we get one of those?' and she was like, 'You can't get a dolphin. What are you gonna do, like, put it in your pool?'
In L.A. you live in a big city, but you feel like you're in the countryside. For example, I can be at home in the swimming pool and be five minutes from everything.
I grew up watching 'Superman.' As a child, when I first learned to dive into a swimming pool, I wasn't diving, I was flying, like Superman. I used to dream of rescuing a girl I had a crush on from a playground bully.
It was actually drumming that gave me the stamina to get into sports later. I started playing drums at 13, and when I got to the international touring level... I got interested in cross-country skiing, long-distance swimming, bicycling... things that require stamina, not finesse.