Cuba Gooding Jr. Quotes

I think that acting involves doing your job so well that you are able to help the viewer identify with the character.

The good and wonderful thing about my whole career is that I've always felt that the audience, if I do it well, will track wherever I go, whether it's President or a lawyer or bad guy or good. All I have to do is execute the material enough where they buy into it. I've had the great luxury of the audiences accepting that.

The day the audience feel they are watching Parvathy instead of the character, that would be me failing as an actor.

One of the things I find about acting is that the less the audience knows about the actor, the more they're able to believe in him in the role.

What I try to do often when I'm acting and what I like when I'm seeing good acting is how authentic it is. How true is this to what I know of the world that's been created for me? The ultimate test for me is, like, if I heard a clip of it on the radio, I'd like the audience not to know if I'm acting.

But today I felt different, today I forgot how long it takes to get into the skin of a character and I remembered it, because today I actually got into that skin and it felt so different.

As an actor, the biggest compliment you can get, in my book is for someone to believe that you're the character.

Acting is not acting. It isn't putting on a face and dancing around in a mask. It's believing that you are that character and playing him as if it were a normal day in the life of that character.

As an actor, you really want to resonate with your audience.

As an actor you become that lighting rod between the person who made the play and the audience.

Sometimes, when you're acting, you are so in the moment that you don't even remember what just happened.

I like to disappear in the parts I play.

In terms of the character itself, I can't really say that I find anything really difficult. I enjoy the character so much I don't perceive difficulty in trying to be him. It's just a matter of how do we get there.

You know, my point in being an actor is to get people to believe that this is not about me, but something else.

That's precisely what we do as actors: try to convince the audience we are somebody else. And if you can do that, you are really doing something.

I take my time to get into the mindset of the character and say my lines. I really have to be the person that I am playing.

I hate acting when I see it. I don't want to feel it, I don't want to see it, I want to be taken away with the story - I don't want the actor's ego in front of me. That's what I try to live when I do the work.

It gives a different kind of high when, as an actor, I get to submit myself to the character I play.

You have to believe that you are the character or the thing or whatever the hell you're playing.

A good actor is somebody who can be truthful and fascinating and interesting and enlightening.

I don't think you can ever completely transform yourself on film, but if you do your job well, you can make people believe that you're the character you're trying to be.

You're creating a different world and the actor's job is to be able to convince the audience to enter into that world, whether it be actually something that you recognize from your own life or not.

Every little thing that people know about you as a person impedes your ability to achieve that kind of terrific suspension of disbelief that happens when an audience goes with an actor and character he's playing.

That's, to me, the ultimate goal - to disappear inside another character and bring them so fully to life that I've convinced other human beings that it's a real person.

As an actor, it's exciting to play a role that's so far from what you are and to have people respond to it like a real human being!