“As Hamlet says, ‘To be or not to be’; ‘The undiscovered country from whose bourn, no traveler returns.’ And he says two words: ‘no more.’ It was no more. You’re gone. I’d never thought about it in my life. But you know actors: It sounds good to say I died once. What is it when there’s no more?”
While many might find the finality of death existentially scary, Pacino says that he takes consolation in his children, and the enduring body of work he’ll leave behind.
And it turns out the brush with death left Pacino largely unfazed: asked by People if it changed how he lives his life, the actor replied “not at all.”
Even in his advanced age, Pacino continues to be a prolific actor: in recent years he appeared in films including Quentin Tarantino’s Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, Martin Scorsese’s The Irishman (earning his 9th Academy Award nomination for playing Jimmy Hoffa) and Ridley Scott’s House of Gucci.