Todd Haynes Quotes

I've played a lot of really smarmy people in film, and it can be real fun, don't get me wrong. But it can be characters I'm not as excited to explore.

I'm lucky that the characters that I get tend to be interesting and a little schizophrenic.

It's the challenge of trying to evoke any kind of sympathy for a role that ordinarily we would say, "Oh, this is a bad guy" and dismiss him.

For me, I have having the time of my life playing this character [Louis Litt]. At times, it's unbelievably challenging and scary, when it comes to certain vulnerable areas that I don't necessarily want to go.

Interesting characters are troubled characters. The only problem I've had in my business is very few people - unfortunately, very vocal - confusing the difficult role that I play with me. I play these guys, but I'm not like them. I've been accused of being difficult to work with.

I'm hesitant to do leading man character roles because I think they can be a little boring in terms of needing to be the everyman who navigates the amazing stuff around them.

I always hope for roles that have some depth and that I can get my teeth into and that will challenge me, in some way.

You never in a million years thought that you would ever end up in a Woody Allen film even though that might be your dream, and there you are. Suddenly you've got one. But you're not playing the quintessential Woody Allen heroine, which is somebody that's full of self-doubt and heartbreakingly naïve. Chloe in Match Point was a nightmare in some ways and totally entitled, and felt like everything was going to be all right. Most of the women in Woody Allen films feel like everything's awful. I didn't understand what to do. But some of the confusion is helpful.

I'd quite like to do a film but I'd also love to do more theatre. I want to keep challenging myself with good roles. It's harder for women because there aren't as many challenging roles.

I've played a lot of bad guys in my time, especially in movies. It's delightful playing the villain. It's almost the most interesting and most complicated role in a film.

I love the wilder, more outlandish characters that are hard to make believable. Those are the ones I want to play.

I'm an actor. I have to play weird characters, quirky characters, strange characters, sometimes characters I don't understand.

I had been playing really interesting roles before I got great roles. Little ones - 'The Crying Game' I loved working on, and then 'Bird,' 'Ghost Dog,' so many films.

I have played characters where I haven't been absorbed - you know, what I call a typical film leading man role where you just have to look gorgeous and be attractive and charming. It bores me. I like a bit of dirt, a bit of sand in the oyster.

Playing dysfunctional characters or crazy characters is only fun if they're well written. So I have been lucky enough to be asked to play crazy people who are very well written.

Yes, you want to do studio movies, but I also want to grow as an actor, and an actress like me is not going to get roles where you grow and evolve in a studio film. It's just not gonna happen.

Ranbir doesn't like to portray characters which are larger than life. I am very proud that he took such challenges.

It's only over time that you get to exploring or adding nuances to the character. Like my part in 'Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara' - I am so not the person who wears high heels and totters about like a poodle.

For an actor to create a different look for every film is not easy.

I feel if the Punjabi cinema is experimenting, I should also at least try and do roles which create a new identity with every film.

I get to play some zany, multilayered, very complex individuals.

With 'Gold,' it was a very simple girl, and in 'Kabir Singh,' it's more of a glam role. That's my aim: I want to experiment as much as I can. These two are very small areas of experimentation.

I'm not going to play someone too far from who I am. Although I did a movie where I played a killer, and that has yet to come out. But that's someone I love being able to shock people with. I could do something you would not expect me to do. My limitations are - I'm not Meryl Streep. I'm not playing anything in a foreign language, or anything too far from who I am.

Theater gave me the confidence to believe I could play something else, 'cause it was so difficult. It was me out of my comfort zone. It gave me the confidence to believe that I could push myself and challenge myself and still succeed. Yeah. I'm very, very glad I did it. And I'm very keen, now, to take what I learned there into more television and film.

I felt violated after certain scenes in the movie [Stone]. She [Lucetta] is a tough character. The choices she makes, especially her sexual choices... it was hard for me to put myself out there like that.