JENNIFER JASON LEIGH

I love Polaroids and I have a Polaroid camera collection from the '50s.

When I find a role I want to play, I just go after it.

People can have so many ill-conceived ideas about me based on the parts that I play. I've had guys, when I've been single, come out of the woodwork to date me and I've found out very quickly that they were expecting some kind of whirlwind, some dramatic crazy person - and that's just not me.

I'm a typical middle child. I'm the mediator. The one that makes everything OK, puts their own needs aside to make sure everybody's happy. It's hard to change your nature, even with years and years of therapy.

Writing, producing and directing, I must say, is incredibly satisfying and gratifying.

I've always done roles that really appealed to me on a gut level and which I found inspiring.

It's very exciting to work with people who inspire you.

I just don't want to talk about my personal life. I feel like it's mine, I'm not trying to promote it. It's nice to have things that are your own, that you value enough that you don't have to use to sell a movie.

I love being in therapy. It's just constantly fulfilling for me.

I'd much rather be in a movie that people have really strong feelings about than one that makes a hundred million dollars but you can't remember because it's just like all the others.

I'd love to have children, and I think marriage is great, I really do.

I like a movie that the audience actively has to participate in, and not just casually observe. Whatever my part in it, just as an audience member, I find that exciting.

Acting for kids is like playing house, you know? But growing up in Hollywood, it just made it seem possible.

I don't really watch my moves all that often; I mean, really, I don't.

I like a movie that the audience actively has to participate in and not just casually observe.

I loved acting as a kid because I was kind of shy, so it brought me out of myself.

I like to investigate all different kinds of people, I guess, and find out what makes them who they are, and try to be honest in the portrayal, and truthful, and find out how to understand that person, how to communicate that person's experience.

I just don't plan things. I live a month at a time.

I could never play the ingenue, the girl next door or the very successful young doctor. That would be a bore.

I used to hang out by the food table at parties because you don't have to talk to anybody. If you do then you can talk about the food.

I hate parties. I don't like big crowded things.

I don't want to play the same person twice, that's not why I wanted to act.

You know, you really do choose your existence in a way.

People equate success with youth. And if you haven't had a certain amount of success by a certain time in your life, it's never going to happen. There's a fear about that. So people start lying about their age really young. I've never done that because I think it's so insignificant.

One of the reasons that I do a lot of different kinds of pictures is because I learn a lot when I'm doing them.