Lily James Quotes

I love acting, but I want to explore other things.

When I started acting, I made a conscious decision that I wanted to be a character read and not a leading man. I didn't want to do the same thing again and again. I wanted to push and challenge myself. I find and embrace new and unique challenges in all mediums.

There are fewer roles, and I've done so many things already that I don't want to repeat, so to find something you haven't done is harder. I don't want to play a country singer again.

Being an actress, I want to play people that are not like me or the characters I've previously played. It's easier to get roles if you play a certain type of character but I don't want to do that.

I don't want to get pigeon-holed into a certain kind of character. I love action roles and the hero, but I want to keep trying something new.

You don't want to pigeonhole yourself.

I mean, you know actors, we always want to do something else, something different.

My whole career is based on taking a left turn after each film and doing the opposite of what I've just done.

I said, I'm on this TV show and I love doing it, but I don't want to be known always as the silly 'Scrubs' guy... So part of me was like, You know what? Life's short. Let's go for it.

There are two sides to being pigeonholed. There's, 'Oh, no, I'm going to be Chandler for the rest of my life,' but there's also the fact that getting to play Chandler opened up doors to me. It's now my job to find things that shake it up a little bit.

Having done 'Misfits' for three years solid, you become known for doing one thing, so I've wanted to change things up as much as possible with each job.

My decision to leave Impact had nothing to with their business or finances and everything with me wanting to challenge myself to something new.

As an actor, it's good to try to do new things, I think.

It gives me more breadth as an actor and as an artist to not be pigeonholed.

I loved plays, I loved films, but I had no desire to act until I had just put out my album 'Like Water for Chocolate.' Creatively, I felt like I'd hit a ceiling, and I needed something else to express myself, and I just decided to take acting classes.

I got involved in lots of different areas round about 2007, 2008. Just working with lots of different people and stretching myself in different ways. I was working on art projects and working with other writers, just doing bits and pieces, trying to keep busy.

Everybody gets to a stage when it's time to move on. I was bored, and the band wasn't going anywhere, so I left. I did a couple of shows on Broadway and some other things. I was busy. I just wasn't making records.

I'm always trying to look for different roles.

Sometimes they try to put you inside a box, but I look at my filmography and I've been able to do a lot.

I like to experiment, and as an actress, I always thought it's good to be open about a lot of things.

I've never really had the opportunity to play something that's a complete departure from me yet.

My overall quest is always to do something that's somehow different from whatever it is that I just got done doing. If that can include occasionally playing an older guy who has a romantic side and a romantic relationship, than that's a real treat.

After 'Rings,' I had two feelings: One, I immediately didn't want to work on anything on a large scale. I wanted to work on something really small after I was finished filming the first three. But the other thing was that I had a continuing interest in working on things that were really different.

All my life, all I've wanted to do was a talk show, and I've done it for most of my life. Now to break away from that is kind of a challenge.

After doing 'War and Peace,' I suddenly got lots of seductress roles. It's easy to put people into a category after you've seen them in one thing that you feel fits with them. But I'm trying to make a conscious decision to do different things.