Some like to start from the inside and then go to the outside. I'm the other type of actor. First, I have to know how my character looks, how he walks, how he drives, how he eats.

I'm just an actor, but if the extra part of it is that I'm helping people or people are being helped by the virtue of what we're doing, then that's just a really nice added extra.

As an actor, I feel that my work makes me very vulnerable. I have to be emotionally available to serve the scene I'm doing. You never quite know where your emotions will take you.

I saw and I met a lot of people who were in the field. It also provided a context in which I came to respect what the actor did, because I saw how difficult it actually was to do.

I certainly have never been an actor who can play the Everyman guy - or, I don't tend to get those parts. I've tended to play eccentrics. I've played a lot of villains, of course.

I'm a perfectionist, so doing a high quality, high caliber television show with great actors makes me feel like there's this whole world of television that I've never experienced.

I don't have the slightest desire to speak over my dead brother. It gets on my nerves to always be compared with him. My brother was a magnificent person and an outstanding actor.

When an actor is completely absorbed by some profoundly moving objective so that he throws his whole being passionately into its execution, he reaches a state we call inspiration.

If you're playing a cop in a modern film, you don't have to walk with your spine straight up and bow before a fight. There's a lot of free form of expressing yourself as an actor.

High-level actors can be all about their close-ups and the size of their trailers. I'd heard these horror stories of how a really powerful actor can come in and change your script.

It is my first preference to do films with social significance. Art cinema has given me credibility and status as an actor, but commercial cinema has given me a comfortable living.

I'd love to direct a film, but I don't think I have the temperament for it. I'm very hyper, and I want things to be done ASAP. If I turn director, I might end up killing my actors.

I think by default I wanted to be an actor because, on a movie set as a little kid, the only thing that you can do is be an actor. And I was really enthralled by the whole process.

The worst thing that an actor can do is go into any project with a lack of respect for the material. You can have an opinion about it, but you have to respect yourself in doing it.

A novelty in Polish filmmaking was that it was possible to find funds for a big production. However, at the same time, the state budget committed less and less money to filmmaking.

I was brought up in a house full of women; the first time I realised no one was interrupting me was when I was on stage - that's probably the subconscious reason I became an actor.

I wanted to be a doctor when I was young. I also wanted to be a paramedic, but I always wanted to be an actor as well. I didn't have kids or something that I needed to provide for.

I knew I wanted to be an actor. I just kept saying, "Until somebody tells me to stop, until I have to go get a real job, and until I'm practically homeless, I'm not gonna get one."

One of the things I have an allergic reaction to playing, especially as a black actor, is the mandatory kind of best friend/cop/detective type. You will never see me in that movie.

I was very young when I was in RNBDJ and that journey had enabled me as an actor. I am not very confident of my growth as an actor but I am very confident of my growth as a person.

You always absorb a lot from a great actor. What you want, as an actor, no matter where you are in your career, is a partner who's going to bring everything they have to the scene.

Conversely, the most powerful thing an actor can say is "no." If something is presented and it's a stereotypical role or something, you can say no to that, and that's very powerful.

You get the information, and it's not your job to judge it or not judge it. You adapt, and you do it. That's what we do as actors. We're just as surprised as the viewers, sometimes.

My own personal process with movies is to develop the characters with the actors and, when I've done that properly, you can't imagine anyone else, but that actor, playing that part.

I'm very used to working with first time actors - you can just look back at 'E.T.' with Drew Barrymore, and Christian Bale from 'Empire of the Sun,' who'd never made a movie before.

A lot of actors are just like la la la - they're never really connected and then they're in the scene and then boom. They're looking you in the eyes and they're just really focused.

People told me, when I was coming through the ranks, that a mark of a great actor is one who deals with the period of unemployment as well as they deal with the period of employment

The thing about film-making is I give it everything, that's why I work so hard. I always tell young actors to take charge. It's not that hard. Sign your own cheques, be responsible.

I find that all great directors, and I would include Ben Affleck and Clint Eastwood in that, they have great confidence. And with great confidence comes great freedom for the actor.

Only a fool does not fear actors, but you can't beat them, and if you can't beat them, join them, as they say. As I've got older I've become very interested in that part of the work

I much prefer the company of the crew, the sort of 'blue-collar working person.' I much more have that sensibility than what the public perceives as what a typical actor would have.

Being an actor, imitating to the point of inhabiting the lives of others, may simply be a way of continuing to do what I learned to do as a boy - to travel, mentally and physically.

Everybody always feels that they're right even if they're wrong and that's what a whole actor's career is built around rationalizing your way into whatever character you're playing.

You create this situation where you are so dependent on each other. That's especially true for film. In theater, the actor has much more say, much more control, for better or worse.

As an actor you just want to continue to work on things that you like. You can be in this business a long time and consistently working and just be totally artistically unfulfilled.

I have like 10 actors and 100 aliens in the film [Valerian]. And they come from the four corners of the universe. Some of them are liquid. Some of them are just [so visually] crazy.

I think a lot of what you do depends on the other people in the cast. It doesn't only depend on you the actor, but it depends on a variety of things, what the other actors are like.

When I walk into a screening, I'm nervous in a different way than I am as an actor. But the response is ultimately I know how I feel about it and that's what matters to me the most.

All my life, all my life that I can, as far back as I can remember, I saw my first movie when I was six years old. And since then I wanted to do that. I wanted to be a part of that.

I think when your image becomes so big that it's hard for a viewer to see a character, then I think you're in danger as an actor of being unable to perform what you should be doing.

An actor's job is to do their job. It's great if it's successful and it's fantastic when it's a huge hit, but at the same time, you're there to do a job and make sure you do it well.

If I had had to struggle at the beginning like most actors... Id never have stuck it out. But having such complete success at the beginning, I was stuck with being an actor for life.

I was always a singer. But I was always focused on being an actor as my trade. Music I do just for me. The movie business is very difficult but the music business is just impossible.

Once you sign on as an actor, you know, you don't go to the editing room, you don't see how they cut, you don't see how they score, you don't see how they cast the rest of the movie.

I have no desire to be a lead actor or anything. I was offered things and occasionally something comes along, but for the most part I'm pretty much, "You've got to be joking, right?"

The virtue you would like to have, assume it is already yours, appropriate it, enter into the part and live the character just as the great actor is absorbed in... the part he plays.

If it's something that reaches out and grabs me, I want to do it. I have a lot of trouble doing things that don't grab me. So, I'm not a very good actor in that way. I can't fake it.

Heres the thing: If youre taking roles that arent intimidating you, and I think this is a cliche that a lot of actors say, but if its not intimidating you, then why are you doing it?

I always wanted to be normal. I tried really hard, but it's like I try so hard and then people still say I'm offbeat. I've learnt to accept that and take advantage of it as an actor.

I'm always excited to be around other actors. I sometimes only get to work with myself, and it's so tedious. I was so excited to go to work every day, and we ran into work every day.

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