MIRA SORVINO

Once you've found something you know how to do, it makes you feel you don't have to be intimidated by someone.

I always feel I can play a role - just give me the time to do the preparation and I'll be it.

There are all kinds of other things I could do, things I would probably like, but only acting would give me emotional fulfillment.

I take the responsibility of choosing seriously because it becomes an indelible part of your body of work. Something has to sing to me.

There was something about being in front of audiences when I was in elementary school plays that gave me a thrill. It was like the rush you get from a roller coaster drop.

Acting is what happens on the way.

My major in college was Chinese Studies. It was very intentional.

I'm doing things that are more artistic again, more close to the material that I love. I don't disparage those things that I did. They're just not as much reflective of who I am.

I assume that if people get to know me, they'll like me. If they don't, it's not my problem.

The name game is frustrating. Agents will say, They love you, but they're going to offer it to Julia Roberts first.

The Oscars have become such a big deal these days that it's just used as adjective.

I could have seen myself going into academia, but I don't love it; I just like it.

Acting is doing, because everything you say or do is some kind of an action, some kind of a verb. You're always connected to the other person through some kind of action.

Being is like pretending.

I had been looking for a New York apartment, but I said, Why not give LA a go?

I want my life to effect the balance to the positive.

I wanted to do something far from my intellectual and physical home, so I went to live in Beijing for eight months and took Mandarin Chinese.

I hope that doing truthful portrayals of people in a variety of circumstances gives people a kind of subterranean link to those characters.

My father taught me how to substitute realities.

Now that I've got some films under my belt, I have the courage of my convictions regarding acting. It gives me a leg to stand on.

I have learned to pare down what I do and still be effective and strong in a role.

I try to become more humble and more myself with every year. There was a while when I got famous where I was so confused and my head was spinning.

We all struggle with our failure to communicate and our failure to reach beyond fear to love people.

I had started off, before I ever got an acting job, working at Robert De Niro's Tribeca Productions as a reader. I was always interested in that side of the camera.

I hate it when people use sex as a weapon against the people who are engaging in it. It's so hypocritical.