Motivational Quotes

Acting and actors

Some scenes you juggle two balls, some scenes you juggle three balls, some scenes you can juggle five balls. The key is always to speak in your own voice. Speak the truth. That's Acting 101. Then you start putting layers on top of that. [On his acting techniques]

- D'Onofrio, Vincent

Best Quotes about Acting and actors

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

Glass, George

Somebody told me I should put a pebble in my mouth to cure my stuttering. Well, I tried it, and during a scene I swallowed the pebble. That was the end of that.

Davies, Marion

Every actor in his heart believes everything bad that's printed about him.

Welles, Orson

I was born at the age of twelve on a Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer lot.

Garland, Judy

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

Duras, Marguerite

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

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

Stanislavisky, Konstantin

Ah just act the way ah feel.

Presley, Elvis

I find myself fascinating.

Dreyfus, Richard

10.

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

Chaplin, Charlie

11.

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

12.

A good many dramatic situations begin with screaming.

Fonda, Jane

13.

Such is an actor's life. We must ride the waves of every film, barfing occasionally, yet maintain our dignity, even as the bulk of our Herculean efforts are keel-hauled before our very eyes. [On filming MacHale's Navy]

Campbell, Bruce

14.

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

15.

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

Field, Eugene

16.

I think I am a much better actor than I have allowed myself to be.

Spacey, Kevin

17.

Celebrity is death --- celebrity -- that's the worst thing that can happen to an actor.

Cusack, John

18.

An actor who knows his business ought to be able to make the London telephone directory sound enthralling.

Sinden, Donald

19.

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

20.

The mere mechanical technique of acting can be taught, but the spirit that is to give life to lifeless forms must be born in a man. No dramatic college can teach its pupils to think or to feel. It is Nature who makes our artists for us, though it may be Art who taught them their right mode of expression.

Wilde, Oscar

21.

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

22.

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

Cervantes, Miguel De

23.

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

Close, Glenn

24.

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

Amiel, Henri Frederic

25.

When I was a fireman I was in a lot of burning buildings. It was a great job, the only job I ever had that compares with the thrill of acting. Before going into a fire, there's the same surge of adrenaline you get just before the camera rolls.

Buscemi, Steve

26.

You are not in business to be popular.

Alley, Kirstie

27.

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

Newman, Paul

28.

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

George, Boy

29.

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

Hepburn, Katharine

30.

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

31.

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

Byron, Lord

32.

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

33.

It's not a field, I think, for people who need to have success every day: if you can't live with a nightly sort of disaster, you should get out. I wouldn't describe myself as lacking in confidence, but I would just say that the ghosts you chase you never catch.

Malkovich, John

34.

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

Quinn, Anthony

35.

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

Python, Monty

36.

Every time I get a script it's a matter of trying to know what I could do with it. I see colors, imagery. It has to have a smell. It's like falling in love. You can't give a reason why.

Olin, Lena

37.

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

Marceau, Marcel

38.

An agent is a person who is sore because an actor gets 90% of what they make.

Johnson, Alva

39.

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

40.

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

Goldblum, Jeff

41.

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

Hannah, Daryl

42.

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

43.

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

Baldwin, Alec

44.

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

45.

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

Coleridge, Samuel Taylor

46.

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

47.

I just stopped playing bitches on wheels and peoples' mothers. I have only a few more years to kick up my heels!

Lansbury, Angela

48.

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

Hitchcock, Alfred

49.

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

50.

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