"I'm tired of playing decent fellows", he said in a 1954 interview, "with stiff upper lip and even stiffer morals. I'm going to kill them off before they kill me as an actor. And I want stories written for me, not rejects intended for other fellows... I just inherit them from other people. Often, I find they've left the name of the actor originally suggested for the role. Always the same old names ... Errol Flynn, Gregory Peck ... five or six others. Before the script reaches them, somebody remembers me – especially if it's one of those infernally nice characters."