Motivational Quotes

Acting and actors

Ah just act the way ah feel.

- Presley, Elvis

Best Quotes about Acting and actors

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

Sinden, Donald

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

An actor is only merchandise.

Chow Yun-Fat

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

Spacey, Kevin

Left eyebrow raised, right eyebrow raised.

Moore, Roger

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

Close, Glenn

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

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

The popularity of that baby-faced boy, who possessed not even the elements of a good actor, was a hallucination in the public mind, and a disgrace to our theatrical history.

Campbell, Thomas

10.

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

Diderot, Denis

11.

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

12.

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

13.

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

14.

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

Moreau, Jeanne

15.

Why, except as a means of livelihood, a man should desire to act on the stage when he has the whole world to act in, is not clear to me.

Shaw, George Bernard

16.

I am the Fred Astaire of karate.

Damme, Jean-Claude Van

17.

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

18.

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

Hazlitt, William

19.

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

Byron, Lord

20.

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

Pacino, Al

21.

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

22.

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

23.

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

Coleridge, Samuel Taylor

24.

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

Half, Robert

25.

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

26.

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

27.

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

Hitchcock, Alfred

28.

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

29.

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

Vaughan, Bill

30.

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

Johnson, Alva

31.

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

32.

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

33.

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

Hepburn, Katharine

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.

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

36.

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

37.

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

38.

A good many dramatic situations begin with screaming.

Fonda, Jane

39.

Insecurity, commonly regarded as a weakness in normal people, is the basic tool of the actor's trade.

Richardson, Miranda

40.

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

Goldblum, Jeff

41.

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

42.

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

Shearer, Norma

43.

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

Marceau, Marcel

44.

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

Barthes, Roland

45.

Ah just act the way ah feel.

Presley, Elvis

46.

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

47.

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

48.

You are not in business to be popular.

Alley, Kirstie

49.

Actors die so loud.

Miller, Henry

50.

Speak the speech, I pray you, as I pronounced it to you -- tripping on the tongue; but if you mouth it, as many of your players do, I had as Leif the town-crier spoke my lines. Nor do not saw the air too much with your hand, thus, but use all gently; for in the very torrent, tempest, and as I may say, the whirlwind of your passion, you must acquire and beget a temperance that may give it smoothness.

Shakespeare, William