Willem Dafoe Quotes

It's not good just to have life experience of film-making and that's all. It's hard to play a real person when you've been in jets and town cars for three years.

I've done films where we don't rehearse, and I've done films where we heavily rehearse. I like rehearsals.

When you do a play, or even a movie, you have weeks to finesse your character. You really understand why they do what they do. In TV, you get new material weekly about your character.

Coming from theater, and having been to acting school, and done little, small Australian independent movies, a lot of the time, it's always about character.

When I do film, I really take on roles and I take on characters.

As an actor, I love working with directors. As much as I love working with other actors.

A lot of actors and actresses pull from past experiences.

Preparation is really important for actors; they need to know who they are, where they're from, and the experiences up to the point that we make the film.

I'm one of those actors who finds the part in the wardrobe.

Acting has always been something I've wanted to get into. I think the best models are actors; you're taking on a character. In that sense, I have been acting for a long time. It didn't seem like a crazy transition.

I think that different actors go about their preparation differently, but when it comes to acting, I use my imagination.

I've had to make the transition from sweeping in for 15 minutes, doing my stuff and clearing out, to carrying a movie for the duration - in a dress.

I'm not the kind of actor that would know what my character had for breakfast last Tuesday.

Yeah, I do get to do some theater occasionally. I don't get to do it as much as I would like to.

I think the buzz of acting is playing people different to you, and for me, that means traversing all genres.

What's interesting about the process of acting is how often you don't know what you're doing.

The process changes slightly from role to role. Obviously, there are different things you're called on to do. You're not digging deep for Basher Tarr like I was for Paul Rusesabagina, but at the end of the day it's still all make-believe and you still are trying as realistically as you can to depict these characters.

I work a lot; I love to compose, ponder, and take notes when preparing for a role. I cut all the scenes, collate the images, form the character and shape its personality, then I make meticulous notes and transcribe each scene on my notebook.

When there's no technical problems, if you did the right casting, and the scene is well written, the actor will give you a strong performance with his intuition right from the start.

I think acting really helps as a director. It's just no question, because you totally understand the acting process.

Creating a role is an interesting thing - each show or each situation is different.

They did cast me as an ingenue once, and the novelty was nice. But I said, 'There is nothing here to play!' I really like getting into the meat of a role.

Of course, I love chats with various actors about the process and how they do it. To me, if it's not on the camera, if it's not there, it's not worth it. It really just isn't worth it.

I'm still fighting really hard to get any role I get. If it's comedy, I go for the laughs. And if it's drama, I try to tell the truth, and try to play the real stakes of whatever scenario the character's in.

I think theatre helped, only because it was acting experience. I got to work with a lot of directors.