Kerry Washington Quotes

When moms and dads put their kids in acting class, good luck. Because you're just filling them with stuff they don't need yet.

My mom was a theater teacher and helped me out a lot as a kid when I was starting out.

Mum got me involved in every activity under the sun - singing, dancing and drama classes at the Anna Scher theatre school.

I started singing when I was about 3 and dancing soon after. Mom just started looking for outlets where I could perform and availed herself of any opportunity she could in the mountains of North Carolina in the '70s.

My mom was a single mother, raising my sister and me. My mom has an incredible talent for living in the world without traditional structure, and her friend, who was in advertising, put me in a commercial when I was five. It was just to make money.

I was pursuing the arts with theater in school, and I was doing after-school activities, but not in any real movement towards a professional career.

I loved being away from school. I didn't really fancy school that much when I was little; it wasn't until I was in third or fourth grade that I really settled down at school and I was much happier at home with my mum and she was very creative and sort of fostered all my interests.

Although I performed in high school, my first real experience with theater was performing with a student-run organization at Vanderbilt University called The Original Cast where I learned that I loved performing and especially loved theater people.

When I was child, I never spoke. Teacher used to write remarks on my note book. My mom sent me to a trainer. I started talking, and it gave me confidence.

I did ballet and gymnastics, and then I started acting when I was eight - just doing amateur theater at a place called Oldham Theatre Workshop in my hometown.

When you're in a single-parent home, they try to give you a good foundation, but by the time you're 4 or 5 years old, from that point on you're pretty much on your own.

My dream is to eventually open a children's theatre.

I actually got started in acting when I was in pre-school. I was really into dance and performing, so my mom had me in dance classes, and then I got involved in a local theater company.

I began drawing when I was nearly 3, and after finishing the sixth grade, I left school to paint and was tutored at home. My father didn't think a formal education was necessary for a painter.

I was mad about the theatre growing up, really mad. We had a local theatre, the Torch, and I used to usher there. I would see the shows over and over again.

My family was artistic and encouraged me to express myself. I was a show-off, so they took me to ballet class.

My mum enrolled me in this free dance class because I had so much energy in the night-time, and she just wanted me to go to sleep. I ended up falling in love with dancing, singing, acting, the whole entertainment world. Then, my mum ended up taking on an extra job so she could fund me to take singing lessons or go to drama classes.

I've been performing since I was a child; my mother would have to pull me aside and tell me that I wasn't onstage. I was a cheerleader, president of choir, and in the school play.

At 17, I became a member of the Boston Repertory Theatre. I had an opportunity pretty quickly and performed with the theater for six years.

I am something of a ham. Yeah, I'd always been a writer. But in high school, I acted in plays. So it wasn't as if you had to drag the words out of my vocal chords.

I did some really bad plays at a children's theater in Kentucky where I'm from and went from there.

I'm not saying that theatre is a doomed profession, but if a person wants to stay in it very long, they'd better develop theatre skills beyond just acting.

I knew in my heart I wanted to do musical theater professionally. I just didn't know how to go about it or how to communicate that to my parents.

I had the great fortune to work with John Houseman at Juilliard.

I've never seen a show at my high school because I was always in them.