Motivational Quotes

Acting and actors

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

Best Quotes about Acting and actors

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

Python, Monty

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

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

Moore, Mary Tyler

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

Richardson, Miranda

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

Diderot, Denis

A lot of what acting is paying attention.

Redford, Robert

There are no small parts. Only small actors.

Rogers, Ginger

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

The best actors do not let the wheels show.

Fonda, Henry

10.

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

Cusack, John

11.

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

12.

I am the Fred Astaire of karate.

Damme, Jean-Claude Van

13.

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

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.

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

16.

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

Johnson, Alva

17.

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

Barthes, Roland

18.

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

Close, Glenn

19.

First of all, I choose the great [roles], and if none of these come, I choose the mediocre ones, and if they don't come, I choose the ones that pay the rent.

Caine, Michael

20.

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

Leoni, Tea

21.

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

22.

All men practice the actor's art.

Petron

23.

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

Stanislavisky, Konstantin

24.

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

25.

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

26.

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

Hitchcock, Alfred

27.

I have to act to live.

Olivier, Sir Lawrence

28.

Actors are one family over the entire world.

Woodard, Alfre

29.

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

30.

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

31.

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

Forrest, Edwin

32.

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

33.

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

Sinden, Donald

34.

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

Irons, Jeremy

35.

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

Marceau, Marcel

36.

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

Amiel, Henri Frederic

37.

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

38.

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

Cervantes, Miguel De

39.

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

40.

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

Half, Robert

41.

You spend all your life trying to do something they put people in asylums for.

Fonda, Jane

42.

Stanislavisky, Konstantin

43.

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

44.

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

Stanislavisky, Konstantin

45.

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

46.

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

47.

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

Welles, Orson

48.

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

49.

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.

50.

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

Spacey, Kevin