Motivational Quotes

Acting and actors

The actor searches vainly for the sound of a vanished tradition, and critic and audience follow suit. We have lost all sense of ritual and ceremony -- whether it be connected with Christmas, birthdays or funerals -- but the words remain with us and old impulses stir in the marrow. We feel we should have rituals, we should do something about getting them and we blame the artists for not finding them for us. So the artist sometimes attempts to find new rituals with only his imagination as his source: he imitates the outer form of ceremonies, pagan or baroque, unfortunately adding his own trapping -- the result is rarely convincing. And after the years and years of weaker and waterier imitations we now find ourselves rejecting the very notion of a holy stage. It is not the fault of the holy that it has become a middle-class weapon to keep the children good.

- Brook, Peter (Stephen Paul)

Best Quotes about Acting and actors

All men practice the actor's art.

Petron

Actors are loved because they are unoriginal. Actors stick to their script. The unoriginal man is loved by the mediocrity because this kind of artistic expression is something to which the merest five-eighth can climb.

Kavanagh, Patrick

I find myself fascinating.

Dreyfus, Richard

An actress must never lose her ego--without it she has no talent.

Shearer, Norma

I am the Fred Astaire of karate.

Damme, Jean-Claude Van

Acting on a good idea is better than just having a good idea.

Half, Robert

A movie camera is like having someone you have a crush on watching you from afar-- you pretend it's not there.

Hannah, Daryl

More than in any other performing arts the lack of respect for acting seems to spring from the fact that every layman considers himself a valid critic.

Hagen, Uta

I have spent more than half a lifetime trying to express the tragic moment.

Marceau, Marcel

10.

The basic essential of a great actor is that he loves himself in acting.

Chaplin, Charlie

11.

First of all, I choose the great [roles], and if none of these come, I choose the mediocre ones, and if they don't come, I choose the ones that pay the rent.

Caine, Michael

12.

Oh! it offends me to the soul to hear a robust periwig-pated fellow, tear a passion to tatters, to very rags, to split the ears of the groundlings.

Shakespeare, William

13.

I have tried to be as eclectic as I possibly can with my professional life, and so far it's been pretty fun.

Hunter, Holly

14.

Talk to them about things they don't know. Try to give them an inferiority complex. If the actress is beautiful, screw her. If she isn't, present her with a valuable painting she will not understand. If they insist on being boring, kick their asses or twist their noses. And that's about all there is to it.

Huston, John

15.

Remember this practical piece of advice: Never come into the theatre with mud on your feet. Leave your dust and dirt outside. Check your little worries, squabbles, petty difficulties with your outside clothing -- all the things that ruin your life and draw your attention away from your art -- at the door.

Stanislavisky, Konstantin

16.

You name it and I've done it. I'd like to say I did it my way. But that line, I'm afraid, belongs to someone else.

Davis Jr., Sammy

17.

The real actor has a direct line to the collective heart.

Davis, Bette

18.

The actor's popularity is evanescent; applauded today, forgotten tomorrow.

Forrest, Edwin

19.

Acting doesn't bring anything to a text. On the contrary, it detracts from it.

Duras, Marguerite

20.

You reach a point where you say you're not going to do juveniles any longer.

Howard, Ron

21.

They are the only honest hypocrites, their life is a voluntary dream, a studied madness.

Hazlitt, William

22.

Left eyebrow raised, right eyebrow raised.

Moore, Roger

23.

I really think that effective acting has to do literally with the movement of molecules.

Close, Glenn

24.

Acting provides the fulfillment of never being fulfilled. You're never as good as you'd like to be. So there's always something to hope for.

Jackson, Glenda

25.

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.

Dundy, Elaine

26.

She represents the un-vowed aspiration of the male human being, his potential infidelity -- and infidelity of a very special kind, which would lead him to the opposite of his wife, to the woman of wax whom he could model at will, make and unmake in any way he wished, even unto death.

Duras, Marguerite

27.

To see him act is like reading Shakespeare by flashes of lightning.

Coleridge, Samuel Taylor

28.

An actor is a guy who, if you ain't talking about him, he ain't listening.

Glass, George

29.

To grasp the full significance of life is the actor's duty, to interpret it is his problem, and to express it his dedication.

Brando, Marlon

30.

Acting deals with very delicate emotions. It is not putting up a mask. Each time an actor acts he does not hide; he exposes himself.

Moreau, Jeanne

31.

I don't want to read about some of these actresses who are around today. They sound like my niece in Scarsdale. I love my niece in Scarsdale, but I won't buy tickets to see her act.

Price, Vincent

32.

I never said all actors are cattle, what I said was all actors should be treated like cattle.

Hitchcock, Alfred

33.

A man who strains himself on the stage is bound, if he is any good, to strain all the people sitting in the stalls.

Brecht, Bertolt

34.

In civilized life, where the happiness and indeed almost the existence of man, depends on the opinion of his fellow men. He is constantly acting a studied part.

Irving, Washington

35.

Abused as we abuse it at present, dramatic art is in no sense cathartic; it is merely a form of emotional masturbation. It is the rarest thing to find a player who has not had his character affected for the worse by the practice of his profession. Nobody can make a habit of self-exhibition, nobody can exploit his personality for the sake of exercising a kind of hypnotic power over others, and remain untouched by the process.

Huxley, Aldous

36.

Brook, Peter (Stephen Paul)

37.

Players, Sir! I look on them as no better than creatures set upon tables and joint stools to make faces and produce laughter, like dancing dogs.

Johnson, Samuel

38.

I'd prefer not to be the pretty thing in a film. It's such a bloody responsibility to look cute, because people know when you don't and they're like, They're trying to pass her off as the cute girl and she's looking like a bedraggled sack of potatoes.

Driver, Minnie

39.

Ah just act the way ah feel.

Presley, Elvis

40.

I don't think there's a punch-line scheduled, is there?

Python, Monty

41.

A good many dramatic situations begin with screaming.

Fonda, Jane

42.

I have often seen an actor laugh off the stage, but I don't remember ever having seen one weep.

Diderot, Denis

43.

If you give an audience a chance they will do half your acting for you.

Hepburn, Katharine

44.

It's a business you go into because you're an egocentric. It's a very embarrassing profession.

Hepburn, Katharine

45.

Actors die so loud.

Miller, Henry

46.

For an actress to be a success, she must have the face of Venus, the brains of a Minerva, the grace of Terpsichore, the memory of a Macaulay, the figure of Juno, and the hide of a rhinoceros.

Barrymore, Ethel

47.

The actor becomes an emotional athlete. The process is painful -- my personal life suffers.

Pacino, Al

48.

I think every American actor wants to be a movie star. But I never wanted to do stupid movies, I wanted to do films. I vowed I would never do a commercial, nor would I do a soap opera -- both of which I did as soon as I left the [Acting] Company and was starving.

Kline, Kevin

49.

I regard the theatre as the greatest of all art forms, the most immediate way in which a human being can share with another the sense of what it is to be a human being.

Wilder, Thornton

50.

You know how in high school you do these plays and people come up after the show and they're really excited for you? Well, that's what's happening to me right now.

Sorvino, Mira