Kurt Fuller Quotes

I am not a member of the chamber of commerce for show business, believe me, but there are some really good people in the business, and [Tom] Hanks has this everyman decency onscreen, but he actually is that guy.

I suppose there are a lot of people who'd kill to have my career, but I still feel like a fan.

I was a terrible actor, and that's why I got the job: I would allow myself to be so bad that I lowered and got down to WWF standards.

I was probably 34 when I got my first on-camera acting job, and it was through a friend of mine, who was working as a writer on the show, and I've never been more frightened in my life.

I had no idea that, when you audition for television or movies, you go to a big building - like, an office building - and you walk in the room, and everybody, I assumed, was smarter than me and better than me, and there's actors you recognize. I once fainted at an audition.

I just don't feel like part of the fraternity of actors. I do geek out. All the time.

Without being good enough, I started figuring out how to make my way through the minefield of a script, which is what it was to me at the time, and the rest is semi-history.

When real actors are approaching their work, we could be on a little stage somewhere, doing community theater. It's all the same. They're just trying to make the scene work. They're just trying to do the best they can and figure it out.

There are some things you can't unsee, and there are some movies you can't get off IMDB no matter how hard you try.

I also remember that Snoop Dogg visited the set in New York, with a joint in his mouth that looked like a cigar. There's your anger management. I thought, "Isn't he going to get arrested?" It was like he lived on another planet. God bless him, he was very nice. Who wouldn't be nice when you're that stoned?

It's never good to just imitate somebody. That never works, because then you're not filling it with anything.

Most of my experiences have been positive. I know I live a very good life. I'm severely overpaid, but there are people who are much more overpaid than I am. I've been very lucky, and I know that, because I see guys all the time who are struggling and can't make a dime, and they're much better actors than me.

I just don't feel like - I've never felt like - part of the entertainment industry. I still just feel like I'm trying to work my way in. And that's weird.

You don't go to Berkeley to become an actor. In fact, I don't think you go to any school to become an actor. You've just sort of got to go out there and act.

I always liked to go to Vancouver to shoot, because I think Vancouver's a beautiful city.

Do less than you ever thought it was possible to do.

Paul Michael Glaser was very nice to me, and I was again told, "Do less and less and less and less." And I still was bad! I can't believe I kept getting hired after some of these things I did! It's baffling to me. I'll go back and look at it, and I can't even watch it [Running man film].

I was in college, I thought I was going to be a lawyer, I met this girl named Laura who was the most beautiful girl I had ever known, and she was taking an acting class, so I decided to take the same acting class. And I was a terrible actor in college.

Probably my favorite job that I've ever had and probably will have - although I'm reserving judgment on 'Manhattan Love Story,' Tuesday nights at 8:30 on ABC, because it's pretty fun so far - is 'Psych,' which I did for four or five years.

If I had not lived the life I had lived and did not have the wife I have and the children I have, I would never know how to play that role [of Dr. Bedsloe], and I wouldn't have any of those qualities. It's a real example of how it is true that the camera catches everything. Even the stuff you're trying to hide.

I would go to these 'Supernatural' conventions because, well, one, it's like going to your own version of Disneyland. You're adored for an hour or whatever, and then you walk out and you're nobody again, but, boy, when you're there, it must be what it's like to be Brad Pitt all day, you know? You're the best thing going. And it pays pretty well, too! But I was concurrently loved and hated by everybody, because the suspension of disbelief is, uh, pretty high among 'Supernatural' fans.

I don't know: Why aren't people fascinated by air traffic controllers?

To be an actor, a lot of times it's a strange combination of high confidence and low self-esteem. Which is a weird combination to have, but I think it's sort of very common among actors.

I was so thin, I had to run around in the shower to get wet. That kind of thin.

I didn't watch the Emmys because - well, for one, I have been to awards shows, and I understand how it works. For another, sour grapes. Actually, that's probably number one.

I started just naturally turning into a nicer person, and it actually helped broaden and lengthen my career.

Why focus on what somebody might think? Nobody talks [on TV] like people really talk most of the time.

In general, I did what a lot of character actors do: I did it to get girls.

I understand that actors lose their looks, they change over time, but people don't lose their talent. I think that, as people get older and the people who make the decisions get older, they don't like hiring people much older than them because it reminds them of their fathers, and they don't like telling people older than them what to do. It makes them uncomfortable. I think that happens a lot.

I did so much theater, where everybody I worked with was so much better than me, that I just sort of learned.

I grew up as a very sarcastic person. I was always the class clown, and to date girls I had to be really funny. I was really skinny growing up.

I was lucky enough to be a "type." Sort of a bad-guy type at the time, because I was tall and I had dark eyes. A lot of times, you don't have to be good; you just have to be the right type.

Harold Ramis really got my career going and was a friend for a long time. I was doing a play in L.A., and he came to see it a few times and recommended me to Ivan Reitman for Ghostbusters 2. Six months later, I quit real estate and was acting for good, and it was really because Harold took an interest in me and made a phone call and did stuff that people don't usually do, even if they like somebody.

The best thing to do, if you really want to be good, is drink vodka all day, from the second you get up to the second they say, "Cut!"

When you're working, nobody's a star. We're all just actors trying to figure it out.

I had great affection for Dana Carvey, and I think we all thought, "Dana's the guy. There's the comic genius."

I've worked with Jack Nicholson and Robert De Niro and Tom Hanks. I've worked with some really good directors: Woody Allen, Paul Schrader... My God, I've really worked with a lot of people. But I'm intimidated by them, and I'm always thinking, "Oh, my God, he's not going to like me, and I'm going to get fired."

I started out old, but I have to say that I've been very lucky to work consistently since I started. I've really never been out of work.

I was selling real estate at the time, in Pacific Palisades, California, so imagine that: getting a note and a bottle of champagne from Jack Nicholson when I'd barely made a dime as an actor. It really kept me going.

Show business is a great place to fail upward... and I guess that's what I've done.

Playing Destroyo, who was sort of a 'Silence Of The Lambs' type character, I'd say I was wearing about 50 pounds of rubber and foam rubber and makeup. But I had no idea who The Tick was. I'm not a big graphic-novel guy. I don't even know if 'The Tick' was a graphic novel!

I always had to rely on humor and sarcasm. And when I started having kids, that doesn't work with kids. Kids don't understand sarcasm, and they certainly don't understand my humor.

I got all of my out-of-work time done in the years when I first came to L.A.!

I can't emphasize the immediate panic that would set in when I had to audition. I can't believe I did it.

I have nothing bad to say about Hulk Hogan. In fact, compared to what I have seen in the press and all the high jinks of his life, I didn't see any of that coming, man. He was just a businessman who worked out.

I guess show business is a lot like baseball: "Wait until next year!" You just never know. Some of the shittiest shows I've ever seen run forever, and some of the best things never get a chance.