Competition [in a scene] is healthy. Competition is life. Yet most actors refuse to acknowledge this. They don't want to compete. They want to get along. And they are therefore not first-rate actors.

To go into acting is like asking for admission to an insane asylum. Anyone may apply, but only the certifiably insane are admitted.

An actor is looking for conflict. Conflict is what creates drama. We are taught to avoid trouble [so] actors don't realize they must go looking for it. Plays are written about...the extraordinary, the unusual, the climaxes. The more conflict actors find, the more interesting the performance.

If we lived for reality, we'd be dead, every last one of us. Only dreams keep us going.

Humor [in a scene] is not jokes. It is that attitude toward being alive without which you would long ago have jumped off the 59th Street Bridge.

The first step to a better audition is to give up character and use yourself.

The actor needs to find out what the basic fight is in every character in every scene.