Marcel Marceau Quotes

I learned mime back when I was in college, at Ball State University, Indiana. That woke up my body from the neck down and made me realize that acting and communication - portraying a story, event, or emotion - is a full-body experience.

I studied and performed and even taught mime years ago.

For many years, I did pantomime with Marcel Marceau. I was a writer for him and got to know very well how to use the body for illustration. I wanted to do a mother without arms, but using the arms of her son in Santa Sangre. The tragedy should always have something funny. Something weird.

Dance is just like film in that it allows for thoughts in movement.

Everybody uses mime and gesture in real life, though we don't realize it. It's very useful as a performance technique, though it can be boring to watch on its own.

Physical expression was my first language: Before I was an actor, I was a dancer, an acrobat, a mime and a street performer.

I am a company in myself. My repertoire has become a bible for all mimes in the world.

Mime makes the invisible, visible and the visible, invisible.

I never liked miming.

When I was dancing, whether it was the music or the story, the question was 'Why am I doing this piece, and why am I dancing?' It is exactly the same when you are acting. You have a very close relationship with your body movement. You have to find the physicality of your character.

My body can't demonstrate. It isn't willing to explore movements the way it used to. I've always had to find the movement in myself then show it in myself. If I've got the sense of movement for the character, I expect the dancer to get it too.

I'm a big fan of pantomime storytelling, being an animator.

You don't have a face to work with, so your voice has to do all the work until you see the animation. So, a lot of it I had to pull back because it was too big.

Dance, theatre, etc. as art, will disappear along with the dominating 'expression' of tragedy and harmony: the movement of life itself will become harmonious.

When I first began choreographing, I never thought of it as choreography but as expressing feelings. Though every piece is different, they are all trying to get at certain things that are difficult to put into words. In the work, everything belongs to everything else - the music, the set, the movement and whatever is said.

I always loved to dance and move. I probably should have been a mime or something like that.

You can do 'Hamlet' while performing cartwheels... as long as the audience sees your eyes - you can make the performance real.

Mime is an art beyond words. It is the art of the essential. And you cannot lie. You have to show the truth.

Just like music, I consider wrestling to be an art form, and I have a vision of what that art should look like.

Mime, like music, knows neither borders nor nationalities.

They say pantomime's a lost art. It's never been a lost art and never will be, because it's too natural to do.

Dancing is another way to communicate. That's what separates The Pussycat Dolls from other groups.

Pretend you are dancing or singing a picture.

I do not say with words. I do not say it with images either.… I do not say, I show. I show people who move and speak. That is all I know how to do, but that is my true subject.

I've stopped showing actors what to actually do. I rather just talk to them about it. Then I usually play music. That's a great way to convey inner emotion, bring the power of style and acting together. That's really what it is, very good acting without talking.