Motivational Quotes

Acting and actors

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

Best Quotes about Acting and actors

The great actors are the luminous ones. They are the great conductors of the stage.

Fiske, Minnie

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

Forrest, Edwin

One forgets too easily the difference between a man and his image, and that there is none between the sound of his voice on the screen and in real life.

Bresson, Robert

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

Hazlitt, William

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

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

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

Goldblum, Jeff

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

This is not a tough job. You read a script. If you like the part and the money is O.K., you do it. Then you remember your lines. You show up on time. You do what the director tells you to do. When you finish, you rest and then go on to the next part. That's it.

Mitchum, Robert

10.

Ah just act the way ah feel.

Presley, Elvis

11.

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

Garland, Judy

12.

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

Moore, Mary Tyler

13.

Acting is happy agony.

Guiness, Sir Alec

14.

Acting is the perfect idiot's profession.

Hepburn, Katharine

15.

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

Marceau, Marcel

16.

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

17.

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

Hannah, Daryl

18.

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

19.

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

Spacey, Kevin

20.

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

21.

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

Stanislavisky, Konstantin

22.

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

Davis, Bette

23.

I am the Fred Astaire of karate.

Damme, Jean-Claude Van

24.

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

25.

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

26.

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

Byron, Lord

27.

A good many dramatic situations begin with screaming.

Fonda, Jane

28.

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

Amiel, Henri Frederic

29.

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

Half, Robert

30.

All men practice the actor's art.

Petron

31.

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

John, Elton

32.

The actors today really need the whip hand. They're so lazy. They haven't got the sense of pride in their profession that the less socially elevated musical comedy and music hall people or acrobats have. The theater has never been any good since the actors became gentlemen.

Auden, W. H.

33.

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

34.

Acting is not about dressing up. Acting is about stripping bare. The whole essence of learning lines is to forget them so you can make them sound like you thought of them that instant.

Jackson, Glenda

35.

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

36.

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

Coleridge, Samuel Taylor

37.

Unless the theatre can ennoble you, make you a better person, you should flee from it.

Stanislavisky, Konstantin

38.

I have to act to live.

Olivier, Sir Lawrence

39.

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

Newman, Paul

40.

Left eyebrow raised, right eyebrow raised.

Moore, Roger

41.

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

42.

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

43.

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

44.

The thing about performance, even if it's only an illusion, is that it is a celebration of the fact that we do contain within ourselves infinite possibilities.

Lewis, Daniel Day

45.

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

George, Boy

46.

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

47.

From '86 until the summer of last year, wherever I went, people would say, You would have made a great James Bond! Weren't you going to be James Bond? You should have been, you could have been, you may have been. Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. It was like unfinished business in my life. I couldn't say no to it this time around.

Brosnan, Pierce

48.

After Blood Simple, everybody thought I was from Texas. After Mississippi Burning, everybody thought I was from Mississippi and uneducated. After Fargo, everybody's going to think I'm from Minnesota, pregnant, and have blonde hair. I don't think you can ever completely transform yourself on film, but if you do your job well, you can make people believe that you're the character you're trying to be.

McDormand, Frances

49.

I was planning to go into architecture. But when I arrived, architecture was filled up. Acting was right next to it, so I signed up for acting instead. [On his college registration experience]

Selleck, Tom

50.

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