Drew Barrymore Quotes

Every time you play a bad girl or guy in a movie, you really come from a place of pain.

I'm certainly not one of those actors who remain in a dark place the entire time in order to be doing the scene. I sort of come in and out of it. It can be to the detriment of my performance sometimes!

I am so used to being up on stage and talking to my fans that it's strange to be on stage and be someone else. I can't look at the audience during 'In the Heights' or I will start talking to them.

All good actors are unpredictable, and a little crazy in a good way, because they feel more secure playing other people than themselves.

As a young performer, I didn't know that you can have a great time playing someone in terrible crisis. The more you know it's not real, the deeper you can go into it. And the easier it is to let it go when it's done.

When I act, a part of me goes into the character I am playing.

As an actor, you are aware of how a role can seep into your real life.

All I have to do is be me on stage. But acting, I have to be someone else, and walk how they would walk and blink how they would blink. I used to talk about it bad like, 'Aw man, that person made $10 million a movie?' But now I understand why they do. I get it now.

I'm always happier and a better actor when I can really lose myself in a character and become somebody else.

Acting is different from stand-up. It gives you this ability to enter into another character, to create another person.

You've got to bring yourself to any character you do.

I would absolutely love to do something with Viola Davis or Meryl Streep. I just think both of those women fall so deep into their characters that you are no longer looking at the actresses, you are looking at the characters they embraced.

I don't prepare myself for any character unless it is really different.

I do enter into character on set, but I can step out of it.

I believe I am a character actor who likes to hide behind my characters.

For an actor, it's not like you have to go crazy to do an intense role.

All my characters are me. I'm not a good enough actor to become a character. I hear about actors who become the role and I think 'I wonder what that feels like.' Because for me, they're all me.

Acting is about covering up traces of who you are and just being the character. I think it's easier to accept people in roles if you don't know a lot about them.

Some actors get by with behaving, not acting. You've got to sell the effect. I act more in the 'Nightmare' movies because it's not like me. I'm acting, not reacting.

It's good for actors to confront those things we have to act: panic, pain and death.

What's the classical moment that every actor or actress deals with? A tragic thing. They get that blank, faraway look in their eyes. But in life, it's not that way.

Sometimes I think of movie acting as advanced pretend.

As an actor, you try to bring as much of yourself to a part to try and create a feeling of authenticity and emotional truth and resonance.

With 'Richard,' I was excited to make this film with such an amazing role for an actor. Play a wide range of emotion and really invest myself in the character.

That's what acting is. You're pretending to be someone else.