Mahershala Ali Quotes

I liked 'Brighton Beach Memoirs,' which I did with Neil Simon. I kind of was playing him, as Eugene Morris Jerome, and I played that a few times at the very beginning of my career.

I got my Equity Card from Berkeley Rep when I was 22 years old. I was cast in David Saar's 'The Yellow Boat.'

I've had some marvelous parts, but I'm also asked to play characters who are kind of superficial people.

I remember playing the Mad Hatter in a school play and feeling very comfortable in the character.

I was horribly shy all through grade school and high school. But somehow I got up the nerve to audition for one play in high school - 'Auntie Mame.' I got a small part as the fiancee who comes on in the end. I got laughs. I wasn't shy at all doing the part. I can do anything on stage and write it off as a character.

I've been incredibly blessed with good roles the past few years, but none of them compares to the experience of playing Ellsworth on 'Deadwood.' There are times when I've had as much fun or had comparably great material, but as a body of work, playing Ellsworth tops anything else in my lifetime.

The thing about being an actor is that as we get older, there are more and more characters to explore and, in general, they get more complicated, so you get to bring all your crazy life experience to the table.

'Swimming Pool' was a very important moment for me because the character was written for me.

I'm an actor. The fact that I'm involved in Jigsaw, I don't approach Jigsaw any differently than I approached The Nordic in 'The Firm' or FBI Agent Stokes in 'Mississippi Burning.' It's the same deal. It's just that the effect is sometimes different. So I say, people ask me, 'How does it feel to be a horror icon?' I'm thrilled. It's great.

I've been lucky to play characters that are really broad.

I'm not particularly fond of playing villains. I do want to be a working actor, and I've had to look at what was offered to me, what roles I could get, and what I could do with them. Even though I'm not drawn to putting those kinds of darker characters out there, I think it's an interesting challenge.

It wasn't sexual in its element. I wasn't being exploited. I was doing what happened. It was very challenging because I played Phyllis from 15 years old to 53 when she died of breast cancer.

My first paying gig was a play called 'The Voice of the Prairie' at a theater that no longer exists in Chicago called Wisdom Bridge. I played a fast-talking radio huckster - a salesman of crystal sets in the 1920s - and I actually won an award. Look at that! And then promptly didn't get hired for a year.

I played a real nasty little girl but most of the roles I had up until then were very sweet and very nice.

Definitely when you get handed roles like Joel in 'The Last of Us,' that's something that will change your life, and I learned so much from that role.

In 'George Lopez', I played Veronica who's a bratty 18-year-old, and so I feel like it's much easier for me to play that because I feel like a late bloomer. It wasn't difficult or challenging at all because it's not like I haven't been a teenager.

My biggest accomplishment was playing 'Lark' on the daytime drama Port Charles because it was the most regular acting job I have had, and I had to step in and fill someone else's shoes.

Playing Juliet in 'Heavenly Creatures' changed my life, and the role of Clementine in' Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind' opened many new doors creatively.

I wouldn't be able to tackle a character like Rosalee on 'Underground' without having tackled the many characters I've played before.

I've played a lot of bad guys in my time, especially in movies. It's delightful playing the villain. It's almost the most interesting and most complicated role in a film.

'Miss Saigon' was my first professional show. It was one of the first regional productions of 'Miss Saigon.'

I think Ada in 'The Piano' is the most interior character I've ever had the chance to play, either on the stage or in anything I've done for film or TV.

People ask me, 'Are you worried you're going to be typecast as a John Locke type of guy?' I say he's the perfect guy to be typecast as! He's vulnerable and ambitious and sort of unstable. It was a good actor's role.

I had been playing really interesting roles before I got great roles. Little ones - 'The Crying Game' I loved working on, and then 'Bird,' 'Ghost Dog,' so many films.

Every character I approach, from 'Forrest Gump' all the way up to 'The Spoils Before Dying,' has a different set of requirements and always fascinates me.