Motivational Quotes

Acting and actors

The most difficult character in comedy is that of the fool, and he must be no simpleton that plays that part.

- Cervantes, Miguel De

Best Quotes about Acting and actors

I find myself fascinating.

Dreyfus, Richard

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

Stanislavisky, Konstantin

A good many dramatic situations begin with screaming.

Fonda, Jane

I'm an assistant storyteller. It's like being a waiter or a gas-station attendant, but I'm waiting on six million people a week, if I'm lucky. [On being an actor]

Ford, Harrison

I want to do a musical movie. Like Evita, but with good music.

John, Elton

If you have to be in a soap opera try not to get the worst role.

George, Boy

The face of Garbo is an Idea, that of Hepburn an Event.

Barthes, Roland

In Europe an actor is an artist. In Hollywood, if he isn't working, he's a bum.

Quinn, Anthony

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

10.

The hardest part has been maintaining a small head--remaining down to earth. So many people try to make you more than you are. This business has changed a lot of good people and a lot of good families, and I don't want that to happen to me.

Brandy

11.

I don't do T & A very well because I haven't got much of either.

Leoni, Tea

12.

A true priest is aware of the presence of the altar during every moment that he is conducting a service. It is exactly the same way that a true artist should react to the stage all the time he is in the theater. An actor who is incapable of this feeling will never be a true artist.

Stanislavisky, Konstantin

13.

Ah just act the way ah feel.

Presley, Elvis

14.

We become actors without realizing it, and actors without wanting to.

Amiel, Henri Frederic

15.

Do not try to push your way through to the front ranks of your profession; do not run after distinctions and rewards; but do your utmost to find an entry into the world of beauty.

Stanislavisky, Konstantin

16.

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

Duras, Marguerite

17.

People say I'm cocky, but am I supposed to sit here and be insecure and not know where my future's going or not realize that moviemaking is the greatest thing to happen to me?

Lewis, Juliette

18.

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

Half, Robert

19.

Some people are addicts. If they don't act, they don't exist.

Moreau, Jeanne

20.

Acting is happy agony.

Guiness, Sir Alec

21.

The mug is a tool. My ace in the hole. To have looks is the bonus on top of what motivates me to be an actor. Not to realize they're an asset would be counterproductive to the cause; they serve the common good.

Zane, Billy

22.

Actors often behave like children, and so we're taken for children. I want to be grown up.

Irons, Jeremy

23.

You don't merely give over your creativity to making a film -- you give over your life! In theatre, by contrast, you live these two rather strange lives simultaneously; you have no option but to confront the mould on last night's washing-up.

Lewis, Daniel Day

24.

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

Hepburn, Katharine

25.

We are born at the rise of the curtain and we die with its fall, and every night in the presence of our patrons we write our new creation, and every night it is blotted out forever; and of what use is it to say to audience or to critic, Ah, but you should have seen me last Tuesday?

Macliammoir, Micheal

26.

The best actors do not let the wheels show.

Fonda, Henry

27.

I am acquainted with no immaterial sensuality so delightful as good acting.

Byron, Lord

28.

I was sitting in the looping studio late one night, and I had this epiphany that they weren't paying me for my acting, for God's sake, but to own me. And from then on, it became clear and an awful lot easier to deal with.

Lawless, Lucy

29.

I'm not an actress who can create a character. I play me.

Moore, Mary Tyler

30.

Imagination, industry, and intelligence -- the three I s -- are all indispensable to the actress, but of these three the greatest is, without doubt, imagination.

Terry, Ellen

31.

You are not in business to be popular.

Alley, Kirstie

32.

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

Chaplin, Charlie

33.

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

34.

Acting is a question of absorbing other people's personalities and adding some of your own experience.

Newman, Paul

35.

There were many times my pants were so thin I could sit on a dime and tell if it was heads or tails.

Tracy, Spencer

36.

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

Vaughan, Bill

37.

Stage charm guarantees in advance an actor's hold on the audience, it helps him to carry over to large numbers of people his creative purposes. It enhances his roles and his art. Yet it is of utmost importance that he use this precious gift with prudence, wisdom, and modesty. It is a great shame when he does not realize this and goes on to exploit, to play on his ability to charm.

Stanislavisky, Konstantin

38.

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

39.

You can't do four movies and be good to everybody and be flying all night and shooting all day with a different wig and then be going to sing on Broadway without feeling a little tired. You endlessly feel you're letting somebody down.

Parker, Sarah Jessica

40.

Mr. Clarke played the King all evening as though under constant fear that someone else was about to play the Ace.

Field, Eugene

41.

I don't get acting jobs because of my looks.

Baldwin, Alec

42.

An actor is only merchandise.

Chow Yun-Fat

43.

They are, as it were, train-bearers in the pageant of life, and hold a glass up to humanity, frailer than itself. We see ourselves at second-hand in them: they show us all that we are, all that we wish to be, and all that we dread to be. What brings the resemblance nearer is, that, as they imitate us, we, in our turn, imitate them. There is no class of society whom so many persons regard with affection as actors.

Hazlitt, William

44.

A lot of what acting is paying attention.

Redford, Robert

45.

Actors ought to be larger than life. You come across quite enough ordinary, nondescript people in daily life and I don't see why you should be subjected to them on the stage too.

Sinden, Donald

46.

The most minor gifts and not a very high class way to earn a living. After all, Shirley Temple could do it at the age of four.

Hepburn, Katharine

47.

The main factor in any form of creativeness is the life of a human spirit, that of the actor and his part, their joint feelings and subconscious creation.

Stanislavisky, Konstantin

48.

Acting is nothing more or less than playing. The idea is to humanize life.

Goldblum, Jeff

49.

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

Marceau, Marcel

50.

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

Forrest, Edwin