Pauley Perrette Quotes

When I was 18, I joined the Screen Actors Guild, and after college I came to New York.

I came to New York and started doing stand-up and improv, and started auditioning for commercials and voiceovers and stuff. My first job was on a pilot of that prank show called 'Boiling Points' on MTV.

I'm down to act a little bit - go on a couple auditions or make one of those three-second cameos with one line.

I started out in theater and then I got a job on a soap in New York.

I got my SAG card doing a Kentucky Fried Chicken commercial in Chicago.

The 12 years that I was improvising are why I got the number of commercials I got when I was in New York and why I got 'The Devil Wears Prada,' and it's why I even got in the door for 'Mad Men.'

I was so green, and my background was mostly in theater. The only thing I'd done in front of a camera, besides an infomercial and one commercial, was 'Brothers McMullen.'

I just wanted to do it all. Film and television was so strange to me because I didn't grow up in the business, I didn't know anything about it, and I had never been on set before. But, from the minute I got on set and did 'Old School,' I was like, 'I want to do this!'

When you're starting out, every line in a show or a commercial is like a huge success.

The first part of my career, how I was paying the bills was commercials. I was just doing tons of commercials.

I graduated from a place called Whitworth College in Spokane with a theater degree, then in 1993 I moved to L.A. and auditioned and did very well there. My first gig was playing a skinhead in John Singleton's 'Higher Learning', and I played Glenn Close's son in a TV movie called 'Serving In Silence.'

A friend of my mom's was a casting director so, really as kind of a lark, I had a couple of acting jobs that had just enough exposure to give me the option to continue if I wanted to. I followed through with it.

I have been reading scripts, going to auditions and looking for the right opportunities.

Once you get into a part, and someone sees you, you get asked to do it again.

I've never been one to book a ton of commercials.

I've wanted to do some sort of acting stuff down the line, but modeling is a good way to get comfortable in front of the camera.

I started acting when I was 13 in New York. Worked there for a couple years, then auditioned for a show there that was going to be filming here. Ended up coming out, getting the job and just staying.

I did a lot of community theatre and met a manager that worked out of Philadelphia, and she started sending me up to New York for auditions, and I got the part in a play at Manhattan Theatre Club when I was 15.

The first acting I ever did was an Italian commercial. Once I did that, I said, 'this acting thing is awesome.'

Most of the early part of an actor's career, you do the jobs you get.

I like to act. I work for scale. I don't have an acting agent. I'm in the book.

I'm a working actress.

I was a complete unknown when I did 'Karate Kid.' I'd just done a pilot for a TV show called 'Call to Glory.' And I sat down with John Avildsen and brought still pictures from the show. I brought pictures! At that point, I would've been happy to be in a dog-food commercial.

I particularly want more acting. I've been auditioning a lot, and I definitely want to act.

I started acting when I was in high school, started writing when I got to New York in 1975.