Charlie Kaufman Quotes

I love actors. I love working with actors. I really enjoy the process. I love having those in-depth discussions about the interior of their character, and actors really love to discuss that, too. I could talk about that for days with them. They love that, and I love that.

You spend enough time on set as an actor and it's great when a director was at some point an actor or understands acting. They're able to finesse performances out of you that a lot directors can't get.

I don't really ever think about whether or not I like the characters I'm playing. I'm more into the minutiae of their behaviour or what they're doing in a certain scene.

Also, in my acting, I feel very much like a storyteller, exploring the flaws of the characters that I interpret. I look for the imperfections, and I love a character that is just so flawed.

My favorite part about working in theater is the rehearsal process. I absolutely love the rehearsal process. Working out the characters, figuring the character out, and the relationships between the different characters. I love all of that, which, unfortunately in film, you get very little opportunity to have.

Even when I'm reading a script where I'm supposed to be looking at the lead role, I'll find myself gravitating toward some small weirdo in a few scenes instead. I'm very instinctive like that and I love the challenge of not having a lot of time to create someone who feels real.

From a writer's standpoint, each character and story presents its own unique challenges and delights. I'm deeply curious about all of my characters, and I love peeling away their layers to see what's underneath their skin, or secreted deep within their hearts.

As an actor, I like as much time with the material as possible and given the opportunity, time spent with the other actors in the scene. But that is a rare luxury in working in any TV series.

Quite often my narrator or protagonist may be a man, but I'm not sure he's the more interesting character, or if the more complex character isn't the woman.

I think it's important that a director be able to know his characters inside and out.

I've always been interested in character-driven pieces, and my approach to directing is through acting.

It's kind of up to the actor to deconstruct the scene and deconstruct the character and figure out how to make it real. That's what I love about this job: It's sort of a puzzle each time, and figuring that out is sort the key, whether I'm playing a cop or a killer.

They didn't accept me theory - not a theory, but just a thought I had about this character. I noticed that this man only exists when the boy comes into the grocery.

The characters, to me, in 'Homeland' are not one note in any way.

The scene is never really about moving the story forward on 'Breaking Bad.' That's the functional veneer of the scene, but it's always about what's going on with the characters.

I really fall in love with my characters, even the bad ones. I love getting together with them. They tell me what to do; they take me on a wild and wonderful trip.

“Frank’s” really different from everything I've done. Maybe the one thing that's the same, and the thing that I tend to do, is that I think I can create an intimacy with the characters, like a sense of presence with the people in the film, and that's what I tried to do in “Room” as well.

I'll always find the things that make a role complicated!

I love novels where not much 'happens' but where the interest is in the ideas and analyses of characters.

The core to what makes Fincher really interesting - all the technique and all that, that is not in the center even if it's a big big part - what is in the center is the characters, and he really is interested in that.

All the movies I've made are essentially character-driven movies about people that I'm interested in.

My character has to be alive. It can't be a mere prop, and it has to have a life of its own. I need to have that space to play around and the scope to interact with the people around me. That freedom would give me a lot of margin to improvise with.

We are trying to push the envelope with a lot of characters in 'Brothers.' We are going out of the way and being honest to our roles.

As an actor, you are always looking for subtext, for layers, for what's going on underneath.

A certain luxury when you get to writing a novel is to have the space to have your characters just banter.