Akira Kurosawa Quotes

Flaws are really interesting.

The years nineteen and twenty are a crucial stage in the maturation of character, and if you allow yourself to become warped when you're that age, it will cause you pain when you're older.

Everybody has parts of themselves that they're not 100% happy with - that's what makes you human. And being an actor, your job is to play human beings. Your job is to play real people.

I'm just like anybody. I have my ups and downs.

I always told, Sandra Bullock was my student when she was younger, I always told her it's important that we hold on to our insecurity, the wisdom of insecurity.

I think I'm a pretty open book. We're all a work in progress, and I'm not ashamed to say that I don't have it all together - I don't really think anyone does.

Challenge yourself, its fine not to be a totally finished person.

It's the journey of self, I guess. You start with this kind of loner, outside guy, which a lot of people can relate to, and he goes out into the world.

You'll always end up filling out a character. It might be with aspects of yourself.

I think happiness comes from self-acceptance. We all try different things, and we find some comfortable sense of who we are. We look at our parents and learn and grow and move on. We change.

I try to find what is closest to me in the character. There's many sides to personality, but it's a matter of, do you entertain those specific areas of your personality, or are you afraid to entertain them?

I wrote an episode for 'thirtysomething,' and a producer said, 'That's really good, but what is it about? What does it say about you? What questions are you asking yourself?' I had never thought about that. This comment changed who I was, because it made me look at my own soul, the dark corners in my soul, and accept that dark side.

I had no idea who I was when I started. I was frightened to death and had no natural performing skills.

The more successful I become, the more I want to remain like me, with my defects and insecurities.

I want people to know me as a real person, that I struggle with the same things they do, that I had to teach myself how to get through life in efficient ways.

Just like everyone else, I'm not perfect; I go through challenges as well.

I don't want to sound self-righteous, and I don't want to act like I have it all put together.

I'm not trying to act like I'm Superman or better than anybody else in the game. I'm just telling my story, showing my strengths and weaknesses - as a human, as a person, as a man.

How am I different than anyone else? I'm a human being, and I have my faults, too.

For people who have been following me for a long time, I really hope that they can get to know me a little better, maybe get to know the softer, squishy, emotional side of me, because I usually put up a weird side, so it'll be cool to be able to open up in that way to them.

I see a lot of possibilities in the age of my characters - between 18 and 21. You have a window of opportunity when you leave your childhood behind and have this chance to become what you always wanted to be. For me, that was a time when I could have gone many different ways. I was in flux and deciding what kind of person I would become. There's something interesting about the vision of what that will be and the reality of making that happen, and how you really are what you are. Unless you're "in character," it's impossible to get around that.

I actually think the reason I am interested in certain parts is because I was such a dweeb in high school. When you are such a loser, it's a helpful way in to a lot of characters because even very powerful people are not all that powerful really. They all had a high school. That vulnerability is completely permanent and, as an actor, it's a good thing.

We're all cracked vessels, and we're always in process, I think, every one of us.

It's like that perfection thing, trying to be that thing you're not. You have to feel that discomfort and not try to get rid of it. Accept that aspect and get into it. Acknowledge those feelings and let them be. You are who you are.

The main thing is to be yourself and not allow people to disturb you to be different, because they want you to be different. You gotta be yourself. Many times you throw a mistake due to your own personality or your own character or from interference that you get along the way then you learn, and the main thing is to learn from your mistakes and get better.