Ben Stiller Quotes

A lot of respect to people who do theatre, but I wouldn't make a good theatre actor is what I feel.

I was trained as a dramatic actor. I'm really excited to do some more dramatic stuff.

As an actor, your life experience is just as important as studying.

For me, hour-long drama was always the thing I felt the most comfortable doing, and I've played so many dramatic roles in the theater.

Actresses cannot have any inhibitions while portraying bold characters. It is something that we learn on the first page of the book on acting.

Theatre demands different muscles and different aspects of one's personality.

Acting is all about big hair and funny props... All the great actors knew it. Olivier knew it, Brando knew it.

For the actors, the talent is to serve the demands that I ask of them, to do it with naturality and truth, and to be honest when we were terrified.

I still feel I belong to the theatre. There is nothing more challenging and exciting for an actor than performing before a live audience. The stage is the real testing ground for an actor.

Sometimes I think of movie acting as advanced pretend.

It was my first straight dramatic role, and the most adult, intelligent one I have ever played.

In theater, you're playing characters. You believe you're somebody else, and you're acting.

An actor should be able to create the universe in the palm of his hand.

The job of an actor is the same in all of them, really. I mean, you're just creating a character that you hope people will believe, so it doesn't make that much of a difference really.

It's important to do research. I do that in every play, every actor does.

What I love to do requires portraying different characters, and you have to separate your life from the role.

Anything I learned about the fine art of acting I learned from Hugo.

Most of my training at graduate school was geared towards drama, so I feel good about it, and I can do it, but it requires a lot more work from me. I feel like with drama... well, with all acting, really, you need to honor the truth of the situation.

The reason why I hate working in theatre is the tedium of memorisation. But once that is done, then you feast on this never-ending meal. If you play it correctly, every night is fraught with very high stakes that are very difficult to find in everyday life.

I can't say that I haven't done some bad acting in my time. I have. Usually that involves what we actors call 'indicating,' when you twirl your mustache.

Good acting is consistency of performance.

Acting is like any other art form, in that you have the option to go very big or go very small.

I'm an actor. I love to create.

Acting is a sport, like a game of tennis, and you and your opponent take turns setting the level of play.

I consider that my best performance ever was as Peer Gynt.