300 Quotes on Actors

• Tim Robbins had real confidence in college. He literally stole actors from the theater department at UCLA to be in his plays. The department heads got so mad at him.

  Author: Daphne Zuniga

• There are actors who spend 20 years working and still don't achieve what I've achieved so quickly. So I think my only course of action is to work as hard as I can, not just for the sake of the film, but also to prove to these people that I do have talent.

  Author: Zhang Ziyi

• Comedians are not usually actors, but imitations of actors.

  Author: Johann Zimmermann

• I'm not the sexiest thing in the world, I feel actors who have to 'play' sexy lose all their sex appeal. When they start with the tongue and the heavy lids, it looks so ridiculous. I think you just have to be yourself.

  Author: Stephanie Zimbalist

• Work is good when people are responsible, and in low-budget movies a lot of the actors don't want to be there. They're there to build a resume.

  Author: Sean Young

• With the other fellow actors who have gone astray, I think it's sad that society wants to label the business as doing this to people. It's really not true.

  Author: Tina Yothers

• There's a constant flow of child actors. It's kind of funny to watch the new crew come through. I think, You poor little things. You're going to have to struggle for a long time.

  Author: Tina Yothers

• Acting and writing go together. Actors write because they love words and becoming other people - we love to escape into other characters.

  Author: Susannah York

• I think it's hard to know. Feeling fulfilled, because actors face periods of unemployment, there is nothing worse than being at the top of your game; you have so much to give but do not have the platform to do this.

  Author: Michael York

• I think actors are at the mercy of the opportunities presented to them. So you kind of have to wait for them to choose you. My music is insular - I can choose that.

  Author: Dwight Yoakam

• It's eighty percent script and twenty percent you get great actors. There's nothing else to it.

  Author: William Wyler

• I like to do theater and hopefully be effective. Most actors, at least contemporary actors of my generation, can't do it. They don't have the chops.

  Author: Jeffrey Wright

• Most actors go, 'I read the script and fell in love with it'; I fall in love with the directors.

  Author: Sam Worthington

• After 9/11 and the impending actors' strike of a few years ago, roles dried up for everyone.

  Author: Alfre Woodard

• Television studios bet the farm on reality shows, where they didn't need any actors and movie studios had no plans for any quality movies that required the presence of me.

  Author: Alfre Woodard

• There are certain stars who are not actors. I don't want to be that type.

  Author: Natalie Wood

• Just look at the messages today's media are sending everybody, from TV and commercials to actors and singers. Kids are just drowning in that 24-7 and it's getting really bad.

  Author: Evan Wood

• There are professional negotiators working for the writers and the actors, but basically you've got the writers and actors negotiating against businessmen. That's why you get rhetoric.

  Author: Dick Wolf

• As I've always said, preproduction is so important. When you cast the actors, you've done much of the work. Now, you may need to guide them a little, take it up or down, have them go faster or slower, but the casting process is crucial.

  Author: Robert Wise

• Plastic surgery and breast implants are fine for people who want that, if it makes them feel better about who they are. But, it makes these people, actors especially, fantasy figures for a fantasy world. Acting is about being real being honest.

  Author: Kate Winslet

• Most actors are insecure enough already without having a director who adds to that.

  Author: Marie Windsor

• Hollywood is where they shoot too many pictures and not enough actors.

  Author: Walter Winchell

• You can think of Hollywood as high school. TV actors are freshmen, comedy actors are maybe juniors, and dramatic actors - they're the cool seniors.

  Author: Owen Wilson

• When you're in Los Angeles, nobody bats an eye, they're so used to seeing actors, they just act really cool.

  Author: Luke Wilson

• There is a class system in acting just like in anything else. Black females fall in a category below black male actors.

  Author: Debra Wilson

• A symphony is a stage play with the parts written for instruments instead of for actors.

  Author: Colin Wilson

• I just love working with actors in general.

  Author: Treat Williams

• All good actors are easy to work with. It's the ones that aren't very good who tend to be very difficult.

  Author: Tom Wilkinson

• You can pick out actors by the glazed look that comes into their eyes when the conversation wanders away from themselves.

  Author: Michael Wilding

• Many plays - certainly mine - are like blank checks. The actors and directors put their own signatures on them.

  Author: Thornton Wilder

• A lot of comic actors derive their main force from childish behavior. Most great comics are doing such silly things; you'd say, 'That's what a child would do.'

  Author: Gene Wilder

• Actors fall into this trap if they missed being loved for who they really were and not for what they could do - sing, dance, joke about - then they take that as love.

  Author: Gene Wilder

• Directors say that you should get actors before they are recognized. They will be a pain or have an opinion.

  Author: Dianne Wiest

• Other actors like to rehearse on film-they like 30 or 40 takes. When you get an actor like that, it becomes difficult for me because I'm ready to quit after number two.

  Author: Richard Widmark

• I start with the story, almost in the old campfire sense, and the story leads to both the characters, which actors should best be cast in this story, and the language. The choice of words, more than anything else, creates the feeling that the story gives off.

  Author: Donald Westlake

• I did start reading quite young but I was always read to by my parents, who are both actors. Bedtime stories from when I was about two/three to when I was about 15. In fact they didn't stop until I eventually kind of kicked them out of my bedroom.

  Author: Samuel West

• How many actors have a shot at being a part of something that became a part of pop culture? It's been very rewarding. I'm not getting the 20 million bucks for the new movies, but at least I'm getting warmth and recognition from people wherever I go.

  Author: Adam West

• I know a lot of actors don't watch themselves on TV, but I think it's good to see how else you can improve.

  Author: Michael Welch

• I think actors have a choice of drawing attention to themselves or living on the outskirts.

  Author: Rachel Weisz

• It's also that comedians don't have the kind of narcissism that actors have. They're writers who perform their own material. It's more interesting. And they're sexy because they risk more. Stand-up comedians risk more than anyone.

  Author: Rachel Weisz

• Dustin Hoffman was the greatest. He had so much information to give and he mesmerized me. He really feels for actors who are just starting out and remembers his early days like they were yesterday.

  Author: Amy Weber

• I go through a whole process with the actors first, building and creating characters, then I encourage them to sort of live in that character when they're in the screen.

  Author: Keenen Wayans

• As actors, we went where we wanted to, and the camera followed us: it was like having another person in the room. There was no formal structure to the process. It was very liberating.

  Author: Emily Watson

• I'm not in the loop; I don't know any actors, really, just the ones I work with.

  Author: Denzel Washington

• Billy Campbell who is... I... truly one of the most talented actors today.

  Author: Sela Ward

• I can understand why people get annoyed at being remembered for one thing, but a lot of actors aren't remembered for anything. I don't mind that.

  Author: Julie Walters

• I was an original member of the Actors' Studio.

  Author: Eli Wallach

• I've worked with wonderful actors like Marlon Brando and Henry Fonda.

  Author: Eli Wallach

• I remember that. I was talking to him and I said how great it would be if actors had a tail because I have animals and a tail is so expressive. On a cat you can tell everything. You can tell if they're annoyed. You can tell whether they're scared.

  Author: Christopher Walken

• A lot of talented actors still have to pay their bills.

  Author: Mark Wahlberg

• It's rare that I come across actors who are willing to work as hard on the material as I am.

  Author: Donnie Wahlberg

• What impresses me is the young actors with terrific talent arriving on the scene. They'd have blown us all away in the old days. Guys like Brad Pitt.

  Author: Robert Wagner

• We have actors from other films, from 'Baywatch,' and so on, and these people are looking exactly the opposite of what they are. The transformations were so smooth, and so funny to watch, it was unbelievable.

  Author: Joe Viterelli

• I got to draw monsters, robots and write funny stories. I loved doing that stuff and working with the actors. But it got to be less and less that stuff and more about trying to be everywhere and not being able to do one thing very enjoyably.

  Author: Jhonen Vasquez

• It's such a small industry here you inevitably end up working with the same people over and over again. There are only so many actors to go around, which is good for us.

  Author: Karl Urban

• There's only so much you can do until you get on set and see the aesthetics of what you're dealing with. Then you see what the other players are giving to you. It's all about the transfer of energy between different actors.

  Author: Karl Urban

• My influences were Peter Sellers and the great British character actors.

  Author: Tracey Ullman

• On general principle, I boycott shows that don't employ actors.

  Author: Aisha Tyler

• I think I've had more of a variety in what I've done than most actors.

  Author: John Turturro

• The big gap between the ability of actors is confidence.

  Author: Kathleen Turner

• I, also, found the opportunity to work with the actors extremely gratifying and rewarding.

  Author: Janine Turner

• Actors love mental disorders, dialects, and corsets. Give them one of the three and they're happy.

  Author: Robin Tunney

• I'm a firm believer that actors take to work who they aren't at home. People show their other self in their art or in their work.

  Author: Robin Tunney

• As a director, I also get to sit and watch actors and learn from them in a way that I don't get to do when I'm just acting.

  Author: Stanley Tucci

• Actors need bricks to play with, and in fact we rejected all the improvised fragments we had made without a plan. Improvisation without a plan is like tennis without tennis balls.

  Author: Lars Trier

• 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.

  Author: Lars Trier

• It made me alive to the fact that the most important thing sometimes is what isn't said - to prepare for moments of revelation that can be read entirely on actors' faces without dialogue.

  Author: Robert Towne

• I like actors that are good with pantomime and that can transmit a lot by their presence and attitude more than through their dialogue.

  Author: Guillermo Toro

• I think most actors are shy. I really do. The greatest actors can disappear. I had friends call me the Blend-In Man.

  Author: Rip Torn

• I got into radio when I was eight, and I was one of the busiest child dramatic actors in America.

  Author: Mel Torme

• Only one of us would usually sing lead. Which most of the time was, Mickey or Dave. They thought it was perfectly a natural routine, because Mickey and Dave saw themselves as TV actors.

  Author: Peter Tork

• It was the fashion of the time, still is, to feel that all actors are neurotic, or they would not be actors.

  Author: Gene Tierney

• Fonda and Gary Cooper had the best sense of timing of all the actors I knew.

  Author: Gene Tierney

• I'm as anxious as any viewer would be to see what Temple is going to do next. All I know is that in the second half of the season, he's going to have more sexual tension developing. And it's a great cast - they're all Broadway actors except for me. I aspire to that.

  Author: Sean Thomas

• When you're doing a play you get to go full speed ahead, all night, in front of an audience. It's a roller-coaster ride, responding to other actors, it feeds you.

  Author: Sean Thomas

• I have directed good actors and have gone through the process which is more detailed in theater in a way. You have to get people to stay for two or three hours in a performance. They need more talk and rehearsal than in films.

  Author: Julie Taymor

• The weird thing about this business - and I'm sure this operates in many other things, but it's very present and acute in this business - is that a lot of people don't realize that they have power. Particularly actors.

  Author: Lili Taylor

• My father comes from a generation of film that actors my age don't even know about, which is really sad.

  Author: Amber Tamblyn

• It's like a cast of actors; you're all working together closely under pressure to produce something everyday. And when we put up an issue, it's like the curtains opening on a new play. I really like that daily sense of surprise.

  Author: David Talbot

• In this country, you have movie actors and theatre actors and television actors.

  Author: Max Sydow

• The fuss that actors began making about the difficulty of shifting to sound struck me as perfectly foolish.

  Author: Gloria Swanson

• I'm not that complicated as an actor. I have a formula in which I work, yeah. But not like Sean Penn does. Sean is one of the few actors I know who can work like that, actually becoming the character he is playing, and get consistent results. I don't believe you can ever be someone else. You manifest different levels of your own personality to come up with a character.

  Author: Kiefer Sutherland

• But my favorite period for actors is the 70s. I think so many great movies were made in the 70s. The 90s just seem to be a confused decade. Nobody knows, really, what's going on.

  Author: Ethan Suplee

• The great actresses and actors receive awards for great roles in great films.

  Author: Gloria Stuart

• I pray to be of service to the playwright, the audience, the other actors and my character.

  Author: Lusia Strus

• I personally take cues directly from the script, then I like to surprise the other actors. But you must maintain control on a level and see how far you can go up, down or out emotionally. You have to balance the craft with spontaneity.

  Author: Lusia Strus

• I get bored at the theatre a lot because I notice that there's not always a connection between the actors. They may be technically proficient, but they're not surprising each other. I'm thrilled by actors who make choices that are surprising.

  Author: Lusia Strus

• If I am not right for something there are many talented actors out there that will get it.

  Author: Tara Strong

• I had this sort of idolatry for certain actors who preceded me, people who inspired me, so I'm honored to be that way for young actors.

  Author: Meryl Streep

• Chris Cooper is one of my favorite actors in the world. I've seen him in most everything he's done.

  Author: Meryl Streep

• An actors' tribute to me is in his work.

  Author: Lee Strasberg

• The show was number one in the ratings, Gordon Russell was our head writer, the story lines were magnificent and the acting most exciting. I loved working with Judith Light and all the other actors on the show at that time.

  Author: Michael Storm

• We're actors. We're the opposite of people.

  Author: Tom Stoppard

• I am not a long-run actor. I admire actors who can do that.

  Author: David Stiers

• I've met actors where you think, if only you could just clean up your act and get it together, people would want to work with you. Some people are so difficult, it's not worth working with them!

  Author: Patrick Stewart

• I've met actors where you think, if only you could just clean up your act and get it together, people would want to work with you. Some people are so difficult, it's just not worth working with them.

  Author: Patrick Stewart

• I was very pleased you know, and I was afraid that I might stick out, but I didn't. My happiest thing about that picture is that I proved that American actors can speak as well and also fit in with an ensemble like that.

  Author: Rod Steiger

• I had read the novel and I had heard David Lean was going to direct it - and it came as a surprise to me because American actors, if given the chance, can do style as well as anybody and speak as well as anybody.

  Author: Rod Steiger

• There's just such a premium on hurrying, and the camera is the be all and end all, and the actors had better hurry up and get it right and get it done.

  Author: Mary Steenburgen

• If you got a good imagination, a lot of confidence and you kind of know what you are saying, then you might be able to do it. I know a lot of colorful characters at home that would make great actors.

  Author: Jason Statham

• Remember: there are no small parts, only small actors.

  Author: Konstantin Stanislavisky

• All actors are incredibly insecure.

  Author: Terence Stamp

• I never quite understood these actors - though I envy them sometimes - who can lie out for a year or two. I feel as though time is a real pressing issue, and I want to get as much work done in the time that I have left.

  Author: Sylvester Stallone

• I don't do stunts and I don't think many actors do. For an actor to say they do their own stunts I don't think is very respectful of the profession of stunt men and women.

  Author: Nick Stahl

• I think voiceover is an adjunct that actors have picked up that have given us some security.

  Author: Robert Stack

• There's nothing worse - I don't like listening to actors talk about the process, especially when - I mean, for me I've played a lot of guys, dudes, boys in a sense and this was a challenge for me just to play that official character.

  Author: Scott Speedman

• We can compare classical chess and rapid chess with theatre and cinema - some actors don't like the latter and prefer to work in the theatre.

  Author: Boris Spassky

• We reinvent ourselves to solve a client's problem. It's more than just tweaking. It's rethinking what your audience wants and needs. Isn't that what great actors constantly do?

  Author: Merrie Spaeth

• Love is the one emotion actors allow themselves to believe.

  Author: James Spader

• Paul and I were both struggling actors. One night he would serve me in a restaurant, and the next night I would serve him. It was what out of work actors did.

  Author: David Soul

• Will and Tommy Lee are the only actors I've ever worked with where neither of them want to say any lines.

  Author: Barry Sonnenfeld

• When you know your cast well and their strengths and weaknesses, you can start writing for them, just the way Shakespeare wrote for his actors.

  Author: Stephen Sondheim

• Some directors hardly talk to the actors at all.

  Author: Todd Solondz

• For minority actors, developing our own projects has to be the eventual path. We have a lot of stories to tell and a really unique voice. But none of that is going to be heard as long as we're just the hired hands, acting.

  Author: Jimmy Smits

• I could not separate myself off stage from myself on stage, as so many actors can.

  Author: Kate Smith

• I've obviously made a very nice amount of money. I have a very nice lifestyle. I get to do what I love. Very few actors get to do that, and even fewer are lucky enough to work steadily for 24 years.

  Author: Erika Slezak

• There are lots of people in the world who do have the advantage of going to a good drama school and just decide that they want to be actors. There's nothing wrong with an untrained actor; they have to get their training somehow, they have to learn.

  Author: Erika Slezak

• Challenge America grants go to the towns and hamlets of this sprawling country, where big touring companies will rarely go, and major actors, actresses, writers and artists may never appear in person.

  Author: Louise Slaughter

• With acting I am being led by the script, other actors, the director, etc. But with songwriting I feel it is much more self reliant and allows me to be in the creative experience without being as dependent on others.

  Author: Helen Slater

• I was very introverted. I had glasses and was kind of weird. A lot of actors are pretty weird people.

  Author: Jennifer Sky

• Is this film more interesting than a documentary of the same actors having lunch?

  Author: Gene Siskel

• I'm not like one of those actors who's a frustrated director.

  Author: Gary Sinise

• I've worked with a lot of really fine actors, both on stage and on screen. The level of their game lifts me up and brings the level of my game up to theirs. Always. It's like a constant upgrade.

  Author: Gary Sinise

• The freshest moments in my films have always been with unknown actors.

  Author: John Singleton

• But some actors I have met possess an intelligence that I can only dream of. It's about character, it's about behavior. They understand things about people that I simply don't see.

  Author: Ron Silver

• I do believe all actors are smart.

  Author: Ron Silver

• I've seen people with a tremendous amount of educational background in the field not turn out to be terribly good actors, and I've seen people with no education in the field turn out to be people that I admire quite a bit.

  Author: Ron Silver

• Samuel L. Jackson is one of the best actors there is.

  Author: Joel Siegel

• A White House dinner is the American family assembled, from labor leaders to billionaires, actors, architects, academicians and athletes.

  Author: Hugh Sidey

• I mean, the question actors most often get asked is how they can bear saying the same things over and over again, night after night, but God knows the answer to that is, don't we all anyway; might as well get paid for it.

  Author: Richard Sheridan

• For me, a play is a form of writing which isn't complete until it is interpreted by actors. But it's still a form of writing. And so most of my time is spent thinking about how to write a sentence.

  Author: Wallace Shawn

• There are lots of wonderful old Italian actors. You don't need to take an Egyptian to play an Italian actor.

  Author: Omar Sharif

• I really think the mind of someone who hasn't been welded into place by their work or studios or actors or this whole society is a wonderful mind to work with, so I'd like to do a big picture with an unknown director.

  Author: Joan Severance

• And I haven't met too many actors along the way that haven't told me how much the show has meant to them. It's one of the reasons they say they are doing what they're doing, today.

  Author: David Selby

• You know when you watch old movies, it's always the small parts you remember, the character actors who come in like a breath of fresh air.

  Author: Amy Sedaris

• If a farmer fills his barn with grain, he gets mice. If he leaves it empty, he gets actors.

  Author: Walter Scott

• A lot of actors talk about doing their homework, but very few of them do it.

  Author: Tony Scott

• After filming I like to go home and lie down with my daughter and have a glass of wine so I don't really socialize with the other actors.

  Author: Izabella Scorupco

• A lot of male actors are method actors and they become the characters which they both were.

  Author: Izabella Scorupco

• Every ten years there is a new generation of actors.

  Author: Barbet Schroeder

• You should never ask actors about politics.

  Author: Liev Schreiber

• Some actors need to be rattled and some need to be focused.

  Author: Liev Schreiber

• I thought his performance was absolutely wonderful and had said so, but he seemed, as actors quite often are when they first see.something, to be disappointed. I think he expected more from the film and himself.

  Author: John Schlesinger

• Oh, the relationship with actors and managers and agents and things is a terrible problem sometimes.

  Author: John Schlesinger

• There are certain actors who are very good at improvising, like Dustin Hoffman and Glenda Jackson.

  Author: John Schlesinger

• Theatre is a sacred space for actors. You are responsible; you are in the driving-seat.

  Author: Greta Scacchi

• Hollywood will accept actresses playing ten years older, but actors can play ten years younger.

  Author: Greta Scacchi

• Well, acting is cheap; I knew all these actors who weren't in the Screen Actors Guild yet, and it happened that they were all just about thirty years old.

  Author: John Sayles

• Now that I'm taking some time off from school, I've been reading a lot to make sure I don't forget everything. It's mostly classics and nonfiction accounts from actors, directors and writers from the '40s and '50s.

  Author: Fred Savage

• It is unfortunate that the poor judgment shown by a small group of young actors has tarnished the reputation of every child who has ever appeared before a camera.

  Author: Fred Savage

• They didn't act like people and they didn't act like actors. It's hard to explain. They acted more like they knew they were celebrities and all. I mean they were good, but they were too good.

  Author: J. Salinger

• Great actors try to dismiss all ideas from their conscious mind in order to provide an experience that is real.

  Author: Mark Rylance

• So there's a lot of people tied into believing that the traditional response to the authorship question. In terms of actors, some people get very angry about it.

  Author: Mark Rylance

• Well you know, Woody doesn't rehearse, as opposed to my own method of directing where I really work with actors around a round table for weeks, examining the values of the material, so his technique is very different.

  Author: Mark Rydell

• I usually hang out on the set. I get to know everybody. I have a nice time with the other actors.

  Author: Kurt Russell

• People use the Method as a shield; it shields them from being vulnerable. I hear all these young actors who are like, 'I'm Method, I'm gonna go live in the house, you know, I totally get it, I've done it, I've been there', but one thing I know is it kills spontaneity.

  Author: Mark Ruffalo

• It's the formulaic studio movies the make money, and when they do, the actors in them are automatically movie stars.

  Author: Mickey Rourke

• Actors are one family over the entire world.

  Author: Eleanor Roosevelt

• I've always seen it as the role of an artist to drag his inside out, give the audience all you've got. Writers, actors, singers, all good artists do the same. It isn't supposed to be easy.

  Author: Henry Rollins

• I'm one of those actors who likes to do it wrong nine ways before I come to the tenth way, which is the way I think it should be.

  Author: Wayne Rogers

• Have you ever talked to someone, and you're not even really talking to them? Actors are the worst for that.

  Author: Joe Rogan

• The great difference between screen acting and theatre acting is that screen acting is about reacting - 75% of the time, great screen actors are great reactors.

  Author: Nicolas Roeg

• Most good actors have a huge intelligence about the human condition and a real open heart to different kinds of people and behavior.

  Author: Tim Robbins

• There are dumb actors. But there are dumb politicians and dumb bakers.

  Author: Tim Robbins

• There's nothing more boring than unintelligent actors, because all they have to talk about is themselves and acting. There have to be other things.

  Author: Tim Robbins

• Reason is the historian, but passions are the actors.

  Author: Antoine Rivarol

• What is it about actors? God knows I get bored with actors talking about themselves.

  Author: Alan Rickman

• I had to wear that suit, so I put in my required time in the gym. But I'm not one of those actors who romanticizes his trials working out and brags that he can bench press a panda now.

  Author: Ryan Reynolds

• I always thought that Bill Murray was one of the great actors that I've worked with. And I've worked with all kinds of people who are known primarily for their dramatic work.

  Author: Ivan Reitman

• Because we're actors we can pretend and fake it, but I'd rather the intimate investment was authentic.

  Author: Keanu Reeves

• I had just arrived in New York from California. I was nineteen years old and excited beyond belief. I was an art student and an acting student and behaved as most young actors did - meaning that there was no such thing as a good actor, 'cause you yourself hadn't shown up yet.

  Author: Robert Redford

• My cameraman and I devised a method, which we started using from my second film, which applies mainly to day scenes shot in the studio, where we used bounced light instead of direct light. We agreed with this thing of four or five shadows following the actors is dreadful.

  Author: Satyajit Ray

• Most of the top actors and actresses may be working in ten or twelve films at the same time, so they will give one director two hours and maybe shoot in Bombay in the morning and Madras in the evening. It happens.

  Author: Satyajit Ray

• In L.A., though, people get off busses calling themselves actors, so many are really not professionals.

  Author: John Ratzenberger

• Before 1972, no actors got residuals. They just got paid. No residuals.

  Author: John Ratzenberger

• So many actors have sheer guts, will, and determination; they just need some preparation.

  Author: John Ratzenberger

• I would have started the National Actors Theatre 30 years earlier.

  Author: Tony Randall

• I never achieved my first goal in the National Actors Theatre, which is to have a permanent Acting Company.

  Author: Tony Randall

• The young actors coming out of the Universities are well trained.

  Author: Tony Randall

• I think that most actors don't have very good opinions of themselves.

  Author: Charlotte Rampling

• A lot of young actors will do a scene and then run off and look at themselves. I don't believe in that at all.

  Author: Charlotte Rampling

• Acting is all about big hair and funny props... All the great actors knew it. Olivier knew it, Brando knew it.

  Author: Harold Ramis

• With both Caddyshack and Vacation, it's not like the subjects were serious enough that they engaged my interest for another round. I love the characters, and the actors were great, but I didn't see the need to make another Vacation movie.

  Author: Harold Ramis

• I don't like shows, I don't like to put on a show, I just really want to work intimately with my actors.

  Author: Sam Raimi

• You can take wonderfully talented actors, wonderfully talented writers and producers, and, uh, do a wonderful show!... but if it doesn't hit with the public in two minutes, it's bye-bye.

  Author: Charlotte Rae

• I mean, you know, actors lives - you're forgotten. Look at Barrymore, and look at all the great actors. They're forgotten after awhile.

  Author: Anthony Quinn

• If you watch the show and the characters don't look at each other while they're talking, the actors probably aren't getting along.

  Author: Victoria Pratt

• People get on a show and they fought tooth and nail. Almost 95% of the actors out there want to be on a television series. Then as soon as they get onto one, no, no, I want to be a movie star. This television series stuff, no, no no.

  Author: Victoria Pratt

• Actors cannot go on for over running around the trees.

  Author: Rajendra Prasad

• I don't like actors who try to talk directors into making their part bigger and that's really lame.

  Author: Franka Potente

• Ninety per cent of how you learn is watching great people. When you are surrounded by good actors it lifts your performance.

  Author: Natalie Portman

• It's always strange being a kid on the set, because you're treated like an equal when you're working. But then when you break, the other actors go back to their trailers to take naps and drink beer, and I have to, like, go do school.

  Author: Natalie Portman

• Young actors often don't think of the consequences of doing nudity or sex scenes. They want the role so badly that they agree to be exploited, and then end up embarrassing family, friends, and even strangers.

  Author: Natalie Portman

• The applause is a celebration not only of the actors but also of the audience. It constitutes a shared moment of delight.

  Author: John Polanyi

• I am not one of those actors who believes he has to live the part he is playing. I can turn it on and off.

  Author: Donald Pleasence

• When actors give their input, it can be very ego-driven, and directors are scared of that.

  Author: Michael Pitt

• Music is my main goal, but I'm not going to rush a record out. There are so many actors who have come out with albums these days. I don't want to do it because it's the thing to do. I want to wait until the time is right.

  Author: River Phoenix

• I really respond to diversity, a broader landscape, with actors of different ages and races and backgrounds.

  Author: Ryan Phillippe

• Several of the actors I've had the good fortune of working with stand out in my mind as 'ultimate'. I guess the obvious would be Tom Hanks, because he really is as fun and as genuine as he comes across in his films and interviews.

  Author: Barry Pepper

• I love acting, truly my favorite people are actors.

  Author: Sean Penn

• Soap Actors are fun and interesting. They all have something special that you want to be around.

  Author: Austin Peck

• That's how I like to do it with actors, have them really go for it and I'll tell them when it's too much. It's always easier to bring it back then to push it further.

  Author: Alexander Payne

• I'm one of those fortunate actors who gets to work pretty much every day. I've had a run of good fortune and work with some terrific people who have hired me.

  Author: Rob Paulsen

• When you look at some of the most respected actors there are and the crap that they're in... it didn't used to be that way.

  Author: Jason Patric

• When actors talk about research, they're just patting themselves on the back.

  Author: Jason Patric

• People who call themselves actors and can't ever get work; they do need to get another profession.

  Author: Estelle Parsons

• The staff, stage managers, ushers all behaved as if they respected the actors.

  Author: Estelle Parsons

• There is some sadness for me now about acting because it used to be that there was a reverence for actors.

  Author: Estelle Parsons

• Actors should be timeless and impersonal.

  Author: Anne Parillaud

• Actors always have opinions.

  Author: Joe Pantoliano

• I've worked with Steven Spielberg three times. I'm proud to say that I'm one of those actors that continues to get hired by the same directors.

  Author: Joe Pantoliano

• Good actors are a dime a dozen, but I want actors that are gonna be part of my team and collaborative.

  Author: Joe Pantoliano

• When I interview somebody, I look at their resume to see what they've done, who they've worked with, and how many times. If they've gotten repeat work. Those are the kinds of actors I want to hire.

  Author: Joe Pantoliano

• There's something that sort of weirds me out about actors who want to be rock stars, and the other way around too.

  Author: Gwyneth Paltrow

• Young actors are serious about their work and don't take any time out from it. I'm very serious about my work; there are probably only two films I've done where I had a really good time.

  Author: Miranda Otto

• It is hard sometimes to see how other actors are working when you are working with them.

  Author: Miranda Otto

• It's a lot more fun for actors to cry and rant and rave, or have a drug problem or a drinking problem.

  Author: Jerry Orbach

• I think the choice of actors that we have is a little more varied and rich here in New York than in L.A.

  Author: Jerry Orbach

• I never dreamed that shooting a film would be so hard. There was less regulation then of child actors' hours. Even the concept of acting confused me.

  Author: Tatum O'Neal

• What's fascinating is that when you write a script, it's almost a stream of consciousness. You have an idea that it means something, but you're not always sure what. Then when you get on the set, the actors teach you.

  Author: Gary Oldman

• People imagine that actors are being offered everything and you are not. So things come in and sometimes there are things that I want and can't get a meeting on, or go to a different actors.

  Author: Gary Oldman

• I watch and listen to movies today and am shocked by the way actors deliver their lines. Everybody mumbles now and I don't understand why.

  Author: Maureen O'Hara

• When I was 13 years old, a professional theater company in my town needed a kid actor. I auditioned, and I got the part, so for just a few weeks I became a member of the company and I met some professional actors.

  Author: Trevor Nunn

• After working for years in Hollywood where the actors have taken over, it was a real relief to get down there and not only have some children, but also have some actors that had no attitude.

  Author: Phillip Noyce

• The public must suffer untold pangs from the stiffness, the deliberate stifling of emotion, on the part of many British actors.

  Author: Ivor Novello

• Behind the footlights there is always the applause, which stimulates the actors. On the screen it is a different matter.

  Author: Ivor Novello

• I've never had a desire to be famous. Lots of actors are actually extremely shy. I have shy areas.

  Author: Jeremy Northam

• The best actors instinctively feel out what the other actors need, and they just accommodate it.

  Author: Christopher Nolan

• I've never been one of those actors who has touted myself as a fascinating human being. I had to decide early on whether I was to be an actor or a personality.

  Author: Robert Niro

• I think Hollywood has a class system. The actors are like the inmates, but the truth is they're running the asylum.

  Author: Robert Niro

• When I am cast in a movie where I feel that the woman's part is more interesting, I usually start thinking about Spencer Tracy and Fred Astaire. They seem to be the most clear actors when working with women.

  Author: Jack Nicholson

• The only thing I have never done is a Broadway play. I'm not sure I have the discipline necessary to do a Broadway play. I know it holds a fascination for certain actors.

  Author: Bob Newhart

• My closest friend is canine. I have precious few close friends, and most of them are not actors.

  Author: Judd Nelson

• I'm involved with Recording Artists and Actors Against Drunk Driving. I'm also involved with most children's causes, because children can't help the environment they're in.

  Author: Judd Nelson

• I have, I think to do a play a year is very good if you can afford the time and the energy because it's difficult to do, it's really the actors medium of course, because you're really out there and nobody's yelling cut so, yeah I have.

  Author: David Naughton

• We make a contract within ourselves as actors or directors or writers about how much of ourselves we let into projects. You can actually figure out before you work on something how much blood you will have to let emotionally.

  Author: Ajay Naidu

• Part of the work is determining through what instrument you are playing. Actors are physical, olympian storytellers and we should be able to create entire landscapes with nothing.

  Author: Ajay Naidu

• What we do as actors is we go through phases where you superficially learn all this information.

  Author: Cillian Murphy

• I don't want to be a star. If you have to label me anything, I'm an actor - I guess. A journeyman actor. I think 'star' is what you call actors who can't act.

  Author: Paul Muni

• Actors do like watching girls parade down the runway for some reason.

  Author: Kate Moss

• The advice that I usually give to young actors is that if you can create a character for the stage and keep that character fresh for at least 6 months that means you're doing the show eight times a week.

  Author: Joe Morton

• Last summer a second unit production crew went to France and shot scenes for several of this season's episodes. They shot costumed actors in and around real castles and landmarks, we couldn't possibly have duplicated here in Hollywood.

  Author: Vic Morrow

• Actors are good liars; writers are good liars with good memories.

  Author: Daniel Moran

• The fact of the matter is that most actors are shy people.

  Author: Roger Moore

• There comes a point in many people's lives when they can no longer play the role they have chosen for themselves. When that happens, we are like actors finding that someone has changed the play.

  Author: Brian Moore

• Think of Frank Capra and Preston Sturges. They used the same actors over and over again.

  Author: Matthew Modine

• As much as most of the actors were kind of curious to know what their character meant in relation to the script and to the plot, they really were quite happy to be part of the adventure of not knowing.

  Author: Radha Mitchell

• Actors are rogues and vagabonds. Or they ought to be.

  Author: Helen Mirren

• I heard that the same thing occurred in a scene in Alien, where the creature pops out of the chest of a crewman. The other actors didn't know what was to happen; the director wanted to get true surprise.

  Author: Marvin Minsky

• I allow an area for improvisation because the chemical things actors bring to stories make it not work.

  Author: Vincente Minnelli

• Actors really should be tramps.

  Author: Martin Milner

• I want to aspire to something like what Denzel Washington does, which is try to find scripts written for white actors - or Jodie Foster, who reads scripts for male actors.

  Author: Wentworth Miller

• I spend a lot of my time trying to draw the attention of actors to the minute and subtle details of human behavior, which was the sort of thing I was looking at when I was a neurologist.

  Author: Jonathan Miller

• Actors die so loud.

  Author: Henry Miller

• The actors I would like to work with are Julia Roberts, just because I've admired her work for a long time, well Brad Pitt. I think you know my reasons.

  Author: Christina Milian

• Actors are an insecure breed. It's hard to have your career depend upon other people's opinions of what you do.

  Author: Alyssa Milano

• I pay attention to the actors and stuff, but not even that much. I don't pay attention to who's writing.

  Author: Jason Mewes

• I want to try and work in different genres with different types of actors, on small movies and big movies.

  Author: Sam Mendes

• Actors get pigeonholed very quickly, particularly movie actors. In the theater, one is more used to casting people against type and trusting that their talent and skill will get them through.

  Author: Sam Mendes

• Truly great actors carry their characters in silence with them. They communicate without words the relationships that predate the movie.

  Author: Sam Mendes

• I had great faith in Irish actors, that they'd be hip to the whole theatre thing, and they are. I had no illusions of coming over here as some kind of big shot. It's been a learning experience for me too.

  Author: Christopher Meloni

• We're one of the forces that causes actors to fasten seat belts before they take off chasing the bad guy in the car... or removes some of the cigarette smoking on television.

  Author: Gerald McRaney

• You know, there was not much wire work for any of us actors to do because the extent of what they did was so huge. I mean, they wouldn't just throw you from this table to that wall.

  Author: Julian McMahon

• But what I did think would be interesting is if we created a fictitious story of our own, and then took these stories that we had collected and assigned them to characters who would be played by actors.

  Author: Jim McKay

• I'm sure it's not great fun for them, or for any parent, when their child says they want to be an actor, 'cos it's quite an uncertain business and it can be terribly hard for most actors.

  Author: Ewan McGregor

• I want to run for the Senate from Tennessee. Not now, but when I'm 50, when music dies down a little bit. I know lots of artists and actors have those delusions of grandeur, but ever since I was a kid, it's been of interest to me.

  Author: Tim McGraw

• I've seen many actors go awry by making the wrong choices early on.

  Author: Rose McGowan

• For no. 1, it's great writing, super writing. The second thing is that it's great chemistry with all the actors. We just all got along from the very start. Very get-go, we all got along. We just - it was just like we were all meant to be there together.

  Author: Reba McEntire

• Let's not get too precious about it: actors are not heart surgeons or brain surgeons. We are just entertaining people.

  Author: Malcolm McDowell

• Movie stars have careers - actors work, and then they don't work, and then they work again.

  Author: Frances McDormand

• We chose the actors thru a series of auditions when we started the show.

  Author: Craig McCracken

• Because technically actors are just public servants really. They just tell stories because people need to be told stories. That's all it is. And yet we get treated as though we're important.

  Author: James McAvoy

• Being typecast is a great thing for an actor. I was considered one of the New York mob actors.

  Author: Debi Mazar

• When you consider that you're a character that doesn't speak, but you've still got to react to the other actors, you've got to make a noise of some kind.

  Author: Peter Mayhew

• What the Bleep Do We Know was not written with a deaf person in mind, but when they met me, it clicked with them to have me in it. But that happens with a lot of actors in Hollywood, not just with me.

  Author: Marlee Matlin

• If you've ever been around a group of actors, you've noticed, no doubt, that they can talk of nothing else under the sun but acting. It's exactly the same way with baseball players. Your heart must be in your work.

  Author: Christy Mathewson

• Being an actor myself I realize that all actors believe they are qualified to play any role. If you showed me a script with a black woman character I would tell you that I could do it. That is what we do. We act as if we are someone else.

  Author: Richard Masur

• The deaf community is in a favorable position because they have a national theatre and training groups of their own to get them started. Deaf actors have often acquired very valuable skills and experience before they get their break.

  Author: Richard Masur

• Theater actors like to change character roles. They don't like to always do the same thing.

  Author: Marcello Mastroianni

• Some stars like to hide behind the whole idea of acting. But really good actors are not hiding at all. They're not afraid to be disliked, to be a little unsavoury.

  Author: Mary Mastrantonio

• I'm not a movie star like other actors in the way that I need to walk with a bodyguard.

  Author: Olivier Martinez

• If you compare me to an actor, I'm probably one of the best boxers in the profession. But if you compare me as a boxer, I'm probably one of the best actors.

  Author: Olivier Martinez

• I really believe great actors, even with disease and age, can be great.

  Author: Olivier Martinez

• Any actor will tell you there's more of a schedule to doing a television show. That's why you'll notice a lot of big movie actors are doing television, and they'll tell you, it's because of the schedule.

  Author: Jason Marsden

• I consciously decided not to be a 'London' actor. Those gangster movies made a lot of East End actors think they were movie stars. And I was very aware that they were going to go out of fashion.

  Author: Eddie Marsan

• When I was 18, I joined the Screen Actors Guild, and after college I came to New York.

  Author: Marla Maples

• It's really hard for actors to cross over and get any respect as a singer, and if I could just keep it separate and not use my music in movies, it's cool.

  Author: Taryn Manning

• I think it's easy for directors to stay fresh more than actors, especially once an actor becomes a star. It's hard for Russell Crowe to walk down a street or take a subway. I can fly coach.

  Author: Michael Mann

• I have always been a Malibu Man, like all actors.

  Author: Nick Mancuso

• No matter what happens, we couldn't let people say Asian-American actors can't act.

  Author: Mako

• Ronnie Barker will forever be remembered as one of the great comic actors.

  Author: John Major

• There's so many things I want to do. I want to work with great filmmakers, great actors, great scripts. And there's no reason for me to do anything short of that, because I'm 24, I don't have a family, I don't need to make tons of money, and I'm not dying to get famous.

  Author: Tobey Maguire

• Ninety percent of the preparation we do as actors is just jive. It doesn't do anything.

  Author: William Macy

• I choose movies, I never choose roles. I look at the script. I look at the director. I look at the other actors - and then the role.

  Author: Elle Macpherson

• I just happen to like the work. I like preparing for a role. I like reading. I like analyzing. I like literature. I like emotions. I like working with other actors.

  Author: Elle Macpherson

• So I find the fascination, the love, the incredible skill and everything to do with acting, writing plays, and doing them, just darling. Lovely. I love actors.

  Author: Patrick Macnee

• Actors have an unusual perspective on clothing. You've really got to know the impact of what you're wearing on the character you're playing.

  Author: Kyle MacLachlan

• You know, as I do, actors who, having become worldwide celebrities thanks to a TV series, complain of their lot and declare themselves ready to drop it all.

  Author: James MacArthur

• When the major studios flourished many years ago, an actor was groomed, developed, and worked frequently at his craft. The studios really took care of their actors.

  Author: James MacArthur

• Jerry Weintraub, the producer, might be a pain in the ass, but he really knows how to treat his actors.

  Author: Bernie Mac

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