Wendy Whelan Quotes

'Girls' was my first audition. I'd just taken an audition class, and I was excited to implement those tools.

Learning lines is my biggest challenge.

Acting takes a lot of practice, but so does auditioning.

Giving auditions is a great exercise. They will provide you with a script, and you prepare in 10 minutes. And you perform in front of 100 other people.

This acting was very hard work.

Having done a lot of theater, I'm used to sustaining characters over long periods of time.

It's very good for me to remember what actors go through.

All the things you can do to prepare for a role that free you, in the moment, are great. You have this muscle memory for things. You don't have to act it as much, once you've done it enough.

I think my best teacher and my best study was theater in general. It taught me a lot of patience and a lot of hard work, and I think that theater teaches you that you've got to know your stuff because you only get one chance.

As an actor, you don't know what is going to come next.

Soaps are the best. They really are. If you can do a soap, well, you can do anything. You have to learn pages of dialogue very quickly.

I think one of the mistakes actors make is we're so focused on what we're going to say.

Being an actor is the loneliest thing in the world. You are all alone with your concentration and imagination, and that's all you have.

A wonderful but kind of a terrible truth about acting is that you actually get to a point where you become content with an impossible task: it is really impossible to properly prepare. You kind of have to start over every time.

As an actor, you have to have your history.

I didn't know how to box so I would have looked like a complete street fighter actually, but what we did have to do was pick up some sides and then just memorize them within two days and go there and audition.

People always ask about learning all of your lines as an actor, and it's generally the easiest part of the job.

When I got the audition for 'Big Little Lies,' I knew this project was going to be different than anything I'd ever done. That didn't change the way I approached the role.

Being an actor is actually pretty easy if you can memorize lines.

When I'm reading a script and I see the word 'lumbering' I go, 'Oh, that's probably the part they want me to read for.'

When preparing for auditions, I have no rituals. I just try to be as prepared as possible.

Ultimately, as an actor, it comes down to committing to the text in the script.

I've never had an audition like that before. They don't let you know about anything on 'Mad Men,' because it's a spoiler for everybody. I thought I was on the right track when I was cracking everybody up.

Well, I love acting, and I love acting quick.

I get very competitive, mostly in acting though. When I'm going out for a role or something, that's when I really get very territorial about things.