Motivational Quotes

Acting and actors

The best actors do not let the wheels show.

- Fonda, Henry

Best Quotes about Acting and actors

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

Leoni, Tea

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

Sinden, Donald

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

Spacey, Kevin

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

Fiske, Minnie

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

Hazlitt, William

Ah just act the way ah feel.

Presley, Elvis

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

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

Stanislavisky, Konstantin

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

Lansbury, Angela

10.

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

11.

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

12.

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

Python, Monty

13.

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

14.

I'm an actor. And I guess I've done so many movies I've achieved some high visibility. But a star? I guess I still think of myself as kind of a worker ant.

Whitaker, Forest

15.

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

16.

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

Marceau, Marcel

17.

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

18.

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

Goldblum, Jeff

19.

The best actors do not let the wheels show.

Fonda, Henry

20.

I'm disappointed in acting as a craft. I want everything to go back to Orson Welles and fake noses and changing your voice. It's become so much about personality.

Ulrich, Skeet

21.

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

22.

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

23.

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

Amiel, Henri Frederic

24.

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

Moore, Mary Tyler

25.

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

Field, Eugene

26.

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

John, Elton

27.

All men practice the actor's art.

Petron

28.

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

Cervantes, Miguel De

29.

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

30.

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

31.

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

Baldwin, Alec

32.

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

Shearer, Norma

33.

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

Moreau, Jeanne

34.

For the theatre one needs long arms; it is better to have them too long than too short. An artiste with short arms can never, never make a fine gesture.

Bernhardt, Sarah

35.

Acting is happy agony.

Guiness, Sir Alec

36.

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

37.

I have to act to live.

Olivier, Sir Lawrence

38.

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

39.

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

Davis, Bette

40.

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

Irons, Jeremy

41.

Acting is the expression of a neurotic impulse. It's a bum's life. The principal benefit acting has afforded me is the money to pay for my psychoanalysis.

Brando, Marlon

42.

I am the Fred Astaire of karate.

Damme, Jean-Claude Van

43.

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

44.

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

Forrest, Edwin

45.

Show me a great actor and I'll show you a lousy husband. Show me a great actress, and you've seen the devil.

Fields, W. C.

46.

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

47.

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

Barthes, Roland

48.

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

49.

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

50.

There are no small parts. Only small actors.

Rogers, Ginger