Quotes About Acting

I try to think of acting in terms of thinking and doing. People think of it as, "Oh, let's get inside this guy." They think that acting is being, or feeling, or emoting. It's as much doing. One of the first things you do as an acting student is ask, "Can you say words and do a task at the same time, like sweep a floor?" You get to watch the human condition, and there's always a "doing" aspect of it. This couple, they're carrying backpacks, where are they going? Students? Or are they carrying instruments? It stimulates the imagination. So acting is doing ... and I forget how we got off on that.

This city can be kind of brutal, so you see your dreams from every different angle, but ultimately it's about acting and if you enjoy acting, you will always enjoy acting.

The difference - the fundamental difference between theater acting and film acting is that film acting is disjunctive.

It's fine to have talent, but talent is the last of it. In an acting career, as in an acting performance, you've got to have vitality. The secret of successful acting is identical with a woman's beauty secret: joy in living.

I couldn't believe it! I mean, I'd always dreamed of acting on the screen - my previous background was all theater - but I wasn't sure if the opportunity would ever present itself. Not only was this acting for the screen, this was acting in 'The Hunger Games!' I knew that I had to give this audition my all.

My whole thing is I want to have a backup plan because maybe I won't get another acting job after 'Fame', maybe I'll want to give up on acting in five years or whatever and I want to have something else that I enjoy just as much as I enjoy acting.

And then, one acting class turned into two, turned into four, and then turned into, "I love this. I could do this for the rest of my life. But, I don't have a background in acting. I never acted in college, or did anything like that. How can I go about doing this?" That meant going to grad school and getting some training, and I did. I literally walked down the path. It was real fortuitous for me to walk by that school, that one morning.

And then in the FBI report it says that Hillary Clinton can't remember her exit interview from the FBI because of her concussion because she didn't have a memory. But she was acting as secretary of state at the time which means we had a secretary of state who was acting who doesn't have a memory of what she was doing.

When the scene is over, a lot of people cut. The actors are acting. And they just stop acting. But I think that leaving people in that moment and seeing where else it can go and pushing them to take it further, a lot of special things can happen.

Good acting is good acting, however you learn it. Some people who haven't studied are amazing. Some people like Leonardo DiCaprio are naturally gifted - he's learned technique by working with people early on.

'Serious acting' is the kind of acting that I don't ever respond to.

I believe you have to start with a craft; you don't just start with a dream. You've got to put a lot of work in. If you want to pursue acting, then you go to acting class. If you want to be a dancer, then you learn to dance, which is what I did.

I love acting. I can't imagine anything else that I would do. I know a lot of actors that really want to be directors and be musicians and all that stuff. I like acting and I feel like I'm good at it. It kinda makes me happy. It's actually pretty easy to me and I can't imagine doing anything else at this point because I've been doing it for so long.

When I went to Los Angeles right after high school, I got some acting jobs, and I never, ever wanted to be an actress! Public speaking and acting make me want to vomit. But I have never been nervous singing. When it comes to public speaking, I stumble on my words, sweat, and pull at my clothes.

Working with children is very different than the way in which I work with adults. I never tell the children the actual truth of the thing that I want them to act. Although children are really into play and play acting, and this is a major part of their existence, they never actually find the playing or acting of adults credible.

I enrolled in an acting workshop and my first acting role was on the TV soap opera 'Melrose Place.'

I don't like my voice that much. I think I'm a much better actress than singer. Singing is like going to a party at someone else's house. Acting is like having the party at your own house. When you go to someone else's house for a party, it's not your responsibility at all, but when you have the party at your own house, there's a lot of responsibility. Everyone has to have a good time. So for me, acting is deeper.

I guess at a certain point you think, well, singing is singing and acting is acting.

Acting is a sport. On stage you must be ready to move like a tennis player on his toes. Your concentration must be keen, your reflexes sharp; your body and mind are in top gear, the chase is on. Acting is energy. In the theatre people pay to see energy.

When we say gender is performed, we usually mean that weve taken on a role or were acting in some way and that our acting or our role playing is crucial to the gender that we are and the gender that we present to the world.

What I'm saying not a lot of people say: What is considered good acting today isn't necessarily good acting, because everybody knows what they are doing. Doubt is an important part of the human being. Trust has to be attained.

The acting I got into by doing what we call pantomime, when I was sixteen. And, there were loads of very pretty girls in the show. I realized; I found out very early on, that the lead comic gets the girl. So, that was cool. When I went to university, I studied Economic Social History. And drama. That kind of got me into it. My main passion was to make films. It was never to be an actor. At that time, there weren't many opportunities for a working class Scottish actor. It was kind of an English thing. And it required a certain mannered cerebral acting style that I couldn't relate to.

I'm a geeky actor, in the way that I like the craft of acting. I trained as a stage actor and was given a lot of technical tools to play with. I like the craft of acting. It sounds geeky when I say it, but it's true.

Any system which says, This is a rotten world, wait for the next, give up, do nothing, succumb--that may be the basic Lie and if we participate in believing it and acting (or rather not acting) on it we involve ourselves in the Lie and suffer dreadfully... which only reinforces that particular Lie.

I'm now learning how to distinguish when I'm acting and when I'm not acting - offstage as well as onstage.

I've never changed my approach to acting. I've always felt like I've gotten better. I think that all of us can get better. I feel like, in my acting, I'm better than I was three pictures ago. I think about it. I'm a slow study. It takes me a long time to grasp the material, in order to perform it. But when I come to the set, on the first day, I know the whole movie. That's why I have to start early.

Most people assume because I'm an actor that's all I know about and care about, I'm actually a camera geek and a film geek. I grew up making short films the same time I was acting. For me, it's a motion picture, not a play. I'm just as interested in what the camera department is doing and world building through costume design and production design as I am in acting. I think all good directors do that whether they're an actor or not.

When I was acting, as a hobby, I would devour popular science books and keep up-to-date about what was going on in the science community. And then, suddenly my hobby became my job. I didn't one day say, "I'm not acting. I'm now going to be a science person."

I remember once acting really cool on a bus with this girl named Stephanie. When I got home, I realized that I had a really big zit on my forehead. If you have acne problems, you really shouldn't be acting like Don Juan.

Once I moved to Chicago and started trying to get acting jobs, I just tended to book more things that were comedically based than anything else. I never had the preconceived notion, "I will be a comedic actor." I just thought, "I'll go into acting and see what kind of work I can get."

I've been asked which of the other arts novel-writing is most like, and I have come to believe it is acting. Of course, in terms of pattern it can be like music, in terms of structure it can be like painting, but the job to me is most like acting.

Stylized acting and direction is to realistic acting and direction as poetry is to prose.

Directing takes a lot longer than acting. This was about seven years in development, and then two and a half years with pre-production, production, post and now the release. Not that I have people banging on my door to star in movies, but it takes me out of the acting game for a longer chunk of time.

We had an ancient Russian acting coach at my drama school who said the worst offense you could commit was to let your subtext show. That is the point of acting, is to be saying one thing and not be allowed by society or your predicament to show what you're really feeling. In a way, I think that's why the therapy generation has killed script writing, because all you ever get is people going, "Hi, I'm feeling really angry right now."

I think one of the things that might distinguish me is when I'm going to work as an actor I really try not to worry about my own personal hang-ups and just really concentrate on the work. Because I have such a respect for acting, which is something I feel like I'm constantly learning how to do, that all of my energy is always focused on the acting itself.

Sometimes I think, 'To hell with acting' and then I realize I could be working at a shoe shop. Acting is much cooler.

I have done some formal acting training, because I sucked at acting when I first got to Los Angeles. I'm still one of the worst actors and auditions out there.

I think acting is a gift. I look at someone like Ben Kingsley, and hes incredibly charismatic, even when hes not acting. Hes an incredibly hard worker, and he has a very specific system that he does with his work.

I think that acting is no fun unless it's hard. I'm not titillated by acting or being an actor unless I have to work hard.

But 'Hey Dude' was shot in Arizona, and that took me to the West Coast. We did 65 episodes. It was not a show that a ton of people saw, so it was like doing acting classes and getting paid for it. At that point I had the acting bug. So I went to L.A. to give it a try and never left.

Theater acting is an operation with a scalpel, movie acting is an operation with a laser

Acting is about listening and reacting. John Wayne was right: Acting is just reacting. You don't have to do much - as long as you stay out of the way of others. That's why it works.

Acting is where my heart is. I love acting.

When you're young, you get by on charm and good looks, not that I miss being charming or good-looking, but then you start to understand things about life, about the craft of acting. You approach it a different way. It's much more fun now than it was, because you take more chances and risks. I enjoy acting now more than when I was young.

It's important to have a fallback and other activities that keep you interested. I started acting when I was about nine or 10 years old. My father was a midtown firefighter so I always wanted to be a firefighter, but then acting came along. I have to have a plan B.

It`s not about women acting like man, it`s about women acting like woman and being sucsessful

I think acting is an important profession, because acting can give you pleasure and can teach you at the same time, and that is a good thing.

I'm definitely shy, so it was definitely acting for me to drop a trench coat and be in a bikini and try to get my cousins out of trouble by using my body. That was definitely acting.