Motivational Quotes

Acting and actors

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

- Cusack, John

Best Quotes about Acting and actors

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

Forrest, Edwin

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

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.

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

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

Diderot, Denis

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

Abused as we abuse it at present, dramatic art is in no sense cathartic; it is merely a form of emotional masturbation. It is the rarest thing to find a player who has not had his character affected for the worse by the practice of his profession. Nobody can make a habit of self-exhibition, nobody can exploit his personality for the sake of exercising a kind of hypnotic power over others, and remain untouched by the process.

Huxley, Aldous

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

Python, Monty

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

Irons, Jeremy

10.

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

Davis, Bette

11.

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

12.

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

13.

You reach a point where you say you're not going to do juveniles any longer.

Howard, Ron

14.

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

15.

There are no small parts. Only small actors.

Rogers, Ginger

16.

If I wasn't an actor, I'd be a secret agent.

Wood, Elijah

17.

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

18.

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

19.

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

20.

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

Hepburn, Katharine

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.

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.

A man who strains himself on the stage is bound, if he is any good, to strain all the people sitting in the stalls.

Brecht, Bertolt

24.

Acting is a matter of giving away secrets.

Barkin, Ellen

25.

You are not in business to be popular.

Alley, Kirstie

26.

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

Glass, George

27.

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

George, Boy

28.

The most minor gifts and not a very high class way to earn a living. After all, Shirley Temple could do it at the age of four.

Hepburn, Katharine

29.

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

Spacey, Kevin

30.

Ah just act the way ah feel.

Presley, Elvis

31.

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

Hannah, Daryl

32.

A good many dramatic situations begin with screaming.

Fonda, Jane

33.

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

Hazlitt, William

34.

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

35.

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

36.

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

Coleridge, Samuel Taylor

37.

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

38.

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

Duras, Marguerite

39.

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

Sinden, Donald

40.

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

Vaughan, Bill

41.

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

Fonda, Jane

42.

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

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.

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

45.

The best actors do not let the wheels show.

Fonda, Henry

46.

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

Hitchcock, Alfred

47.

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

Pacino, Al

48.

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

Stanislavisky, Konstantin

49.

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.

50.

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

Moreau, Jeanne