Motivational Quotes

Acting and actors

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

- Goldblum, Jeff

Best Quotes about Acting and actors

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

Cervantes, Miguel De

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

An actor is only merchandise.

Chow Yun-Fat

Ah just act the way ah feel.

Presley, Elvis

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

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

Sinden, Donald

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

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

Irons, Jeremy

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

10.

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

11.

A good many dramatic situations begin with screaming.

Fonda, Jane

12.

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

Amiel, Henri Frederic

13.

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

14.

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

Byron, Lord

15.

Until Ace Ventura, no actor had considered talking through his ass.

Carrey, Jim

16.

In Europe an actor is an artist. In Hollywood, if he isn't working, he's a bum.

Quinn, Anthony

17.

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

Hazlitt, William

18.

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.

19.

There are no small parts. Only small actors.

Rogers, Ginger

20.

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

21.

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

Glass, George

22.

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

23.

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

Half, Robert

24.

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

Cusack, John

25.

Acting provides the fulfillment of never being fulfilled. You're never as good as you'd like to be. So there's always something to hope for.

Jackson, Glenda

26.

Acting is a matter of giving away secrets.

Barkin, Ellen

27.

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

28.

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

Goldblum, Jeff

29.

Actors are one family over the entire world.

Woodard, Alfre

30.

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

Python, Monty

31.

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

Pacino, Al

32.

Imagination, industry, and intelligence -- the three I s -- are all indispensable to the actress, but of these three the greatest is, without doubt, imagination.

Terry, Ellen

33.

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

34.

Left eyebrow raised, right eyebrow raised.

Moore, Roger

35.

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

36.

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

Coleridge, Samuel Taylor

37.

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.

38.

I find myself fascinating.

Dreyfus, Richard

39.

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

Stanislavisky, Konstantin

40.

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

Fiske, Minnie

41.

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

42.

I can't tell you how many shows I've done with full-blown migraine headaches.

Thomas, Jonathan Taylor

43.

You name it and I've done it. I'd like to say I did it my way. But that line, I'm afraid, belongs to someone else.

Davis Jr., Sammy

44.

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

Howard, Ron

45.

The mug is a tool. My ace in the hole. To have looks is the bonus on top of what motivates me to be an actor. Not to realize they're an asset would be counterproductive to the cause; they serve the common good.

Zane, Billy

46.

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

47.

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

Duras, Marguerite

48.

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

49.

You are not in business to be popular.

Alley, Kirstie

50.

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