Sarah Hay Quotes

'24' is a pretty serious show - there isn't a lot of improv that is happening. Having said that, I do play around with the delivery. A lot of the humor comes from playing a character who is very furious and really up in her own brain and in a serious situation. That is humorous to me.

I think I'm interested in these kinds of character dramas, psychological dramas, domestic dramas, whatever you want to call them - comedy dramas.

I don't know if likeable, pleasant characters have enough conflict for me to want to do them. I admire those people, but I've never been that kind of screen presence who can do nothing. I need to do something.

In all my movies, there's always a kind of heartfelt element, to be able to do a drama and to be able to spend more time in the emotional stuff with no pressure to get back to the funny that's very liberating for me.

If you know exactly what your character knows, it's a drama.

For me really good acting is about subtext.

I think I land somewhere between Scorsese and Capra in what I'm drawn to emotionally; I'm drawn to very intense emotion. Capra freaked people out when they saw Jimmy Stewart lose it in 'It's a Wonderful Life.'

My acting teacher used to say that people reveal themselves in their opposites.

Acting is kind of difficult to intellectualize - it's a far more visceral experience. It's really hard to be able to think about and then employ these kind of esoteric notions of this person's backstory and try to weave it in somehow. It's just kind of impossible.

Character and emotionality don't always have to be relegated to quieter, more simple constructs.

'Serious acting' is the kind of acting that I don't ever respond to.

Romcoms are challenging, but I'm hungry for drama.

My tutors at drama school commended and criticised my use of comedy in my acting for a long time at drama school. They said I had a tendency to somehow perform the most tragic of scenes in a slightly flippant way.

Jack Nicholson is a textbook actor who's very intuitive. He is absolutely brilliant at going as far as you can go, always pushing to the edge, but still making it seem real.

I love gritty drama. I'm passionate about films and drama that make you think - hard-hitting, gravelly characters.

I've never been a method actress; I've never been that person that wants to imagine horrible things happening in your own life in order to exploit them for your emotional being in the movie. I'm just not good at doing that.

I love the simplicity of Kevin Spacey's work. He really does a subtle interpretation of every character, and that's kind of my style of acting when it comes to dramatic roles.

I'd like to make character-based dramas. I end up writing thrillers a lot - these psychological character-based things with weird people doing horrible things to each other - coming to a theatre near you!

So I work hard to present the human side of my characters while not neglecting the plot.

I like dark, dramatic roles; they're just really powerful and real.

I always prefer to write songs about emotional situations and heartbreak because I like getting into the character.

Pacino's always played the suffering prince. I just find that interesting.

My primary instinct as an actor is not the big transformation. It's thrilling if a performer can do that well, but that's not me. Often with actors, it's a case of witnessing a big party piece but wondering afterwards, where's the substance?

I'm not an autobiographical writer, but I am a writer who deals with human emotion on all levels.

People sometimes seem surprised because often, you know, you know, there's a lot of tortured characters in the stuff I write.