Kristin Bauer van Straten Quotes

Although my stories are all very different on the surface, I like to write stories about characters struggling with big problems. I'm always reminded, no matter how different from me one of my characters is from me on the surface, how we're all pretty much the same underneath.

I think a lot of people relate to some of my characters' inner struggles.

I want to explore more sides of humanity and myself. That's what acting is about.

Only out of great vulnerability do you discover what strength you have. Having a daughter who I love with all my being has helped me mine the source of that strength to previously unknown depths.

I've done teaching and things like that because if you're acting, you're becoming other human beings, and you need to have time to find who you are as well.

I'm interested in writing that explores all sides of human beings.

I look for characters that offer me opportunities to explore some aspect of the human condition. I think a lot of actors would say that and would look for that. I've been lucky enough to find projects that let me do that.

What I hope my writing reflects... is a sense of the connections between all human beings... and a different perspective on the true nature of courage. For me, those are things worth exploring and writing about.

At the end of the day, you have to find the humanity in you in each character.

I channel a lot of my own personal relationships anytime I prep for something.

The real road, to me, was within the actor, within myself, within my own personality. How much Jeffrey can I find, and how much of Jeffrey could I access? What parts of Jeffrey have I never used for Hank or for George or Oscar? - and that was a delight.

I dig those kinds of roles where I have to dig down and find some internal motivation. I like tough roles.

One of the reasons I took up acting was to learn to be more human, to get in touch with human emotions.

I like being able to play women that are growing or aren't easy to love. Maybe they are really likable, but they're annoying because they're not tapping into who they're suppose to be. You're watching them, and you're like, 'Oh, why does she keep making this decision?'

Every character, before they are heroes or villains, they are human beings.

I'm fascinated with acting now. In retrospect, I was only beginning to chip off the tip of the iceberg with how far I can go or what I was exploring inside of me that I hadn't touched in a while as far as emotional headspaces.

You can play women who have a face on or who zip something up, but you have to dig deeper to actually find the humanity and real aspects.

It's fun to play somebody who's kind of struggling.

I always knew that I could go deep. How deep? I don't know. But it always seems that with each character I take on, I'm challenged to go deeper than the last time, and then again deeper than the last time. This is the deepest I've ever been asked to dive. And to see how deep I actually went for this, and that I wasn't afraid to go there in order to give Tyler exactly what he envisioned for the character, which was pretty deep, that's what I discovered about myself.

Acting is kind of a forced compassion, where you learn that given certain circumstances, you can feel and do things that you never thought yourself capable of. And so it stops you from being super-judgmental.

I feel my characters are valid, my characters are people, my characters have hope. Hope is the thing that'll take us through.

Sometimes the characters that I'm most resistant to are the ones that I find the most satisfying to play, because you have to dig deeper and you have to find different parts of yourself that are not necessarily the first thing you access and that's fun and interesting.

I think there are parts of myself in every character I play.

To be a character who feels a deep emotion, one must go into the memory's vault and mix in a sad memory from one's own life.

What I try to do as an actor is constantly find that, find ways to risk, find opportunities to fall on my face if it's going to be worth it, and then maybe I'll surprise myself.