Pam Grier Quotes

I became an actor to escape my own personality. Acting is the most therapeutic thing in the world. You see, through acting you come full circle in your personality and, oh, what a grand time you can have along the way being wonderful people through your characters...I think all the courage that I may lack personally I have as an actor.

I've gotten to play some pretty intense characters and I tend to think it's therapeutic for me.

I've played a lot of bad guys, and I'm pretty good at leaving my work at the office. And I look at acting as having a certain sort of therapeutic nature to it.

First of all, I never think of my characters as good or evil. I play them as honestly as I can. When you're playing a good character, you have an idea that you're playing the hero and the good guy.

I think it's always difficult no matter how similar your characters are to yourself to get into that mindset, because however much they are similar to you, they're not you.

When I'm [playing] a character, I can look at it and know it's not me and not be concerned with how it looks.

Sometimes an actor performs a character, but sometimes an actor just performs. With writing, I don't think it's performing a character, really, if the character you're performing is yourself. I don't see that as playing a role. It's just appearing in public.

My first experiences with fashion were dressing up. It was always about fantasy for me. Dressing up as characters . . . I always thought that's what clothes were - that they would make you into the person you wanted to be. I'm an actress, so I love to act, and I think that's one of the most important things - the thing that makes you feel like another person.

As an actor, I've been drawn to those characters that are further away from who I may be.

I think all characters that we play are facets of ourselves.

What I like doing is being a different person. Every character is kind of different. So being able to be that person and then when you leave you're yourself again. So it's kind of weird to be like two different people, and I think that's kind of fun.

Sometimes I like to think that characters you play are all the other people you could've been in a lifetime.

I think when you're playing a character in any film it's so crucial to have the costume that makes you feel like you're going to be that character.

I don't think there's a certain part of a character I take with me. There's a certain part of me I leave with each character, though.

I always find it a little scary to say that I'm like a character.

I love doing accents because it takes you one step away from yourself and allows you to embody someone else's character.

I think I had the good fortune to watch Sly the Artist [Sylvester Stallone]; to watch him in all arenas. As an actor, not many people get to see him turn that character on, they don't understand that he's playing a role.

It's fun to play a character when you can't concern yourself with how sympathetic they are.

Acting is a marvelous profession ... If you can spend enough time playing other people, you don't have to think too much about your own character and motivations.

I think in every character there are aspects of yourself that you bring to it. But then it would be really boring to just play yourself.

Usually when you're playing a character, you think a lot about their backstory.

I think my attitude's different when I'm in the different places. I don't walk around in character. I try not to walk around with the accent, but those little things change you, whether it's your hair, your clothes, your shoes or a different silhouette. People absolutely look at you differently.

The character is what trips you up - the thing of, "I'm going to get so dark in this character that I'm going to get lost in a character." You can't get lost in a character. You can only think you're lost in a character.

I always say that I can play sort of six variations on one girl, all of whom are a variation on me. Maybe I'll think of myself as an actor if, like, I do a corset drama.

I'll be able to pull off playing an unlikable character because inherently, I think I'm likable.