Christopher Darden Quotes

Should you create a protagonist based directly on yourself? The problem with this - and it is a very large problem - is that almost no one can view himself objectively on the page. As the writer, you're too close to your own complicated makeup.

I usually look at things like that from an audience perspective first, then have a closer look at the specific character they're talking about me for.

The minute I ever start thinking about what a character would do is the minute I bring my ego into play. It's the minute I'm putting a judgment on something.

But I always wanted my characters to be more than cyphers for the failings of their world. And I never had to look too hard to find a part of myself in them.

As an actor, you have to understand how you are seen and then play with that. Otherwise, my looks are not important.

I normally don't concern myself with, 'Will audiences like me or like my character?'

There are times that I see comments on Instagram and Twitter - if you are bashing my character on television, that is fine. I am totally cool with that. I'm a bad guy for a reason. You are supposed to hate me, but when you disrespect me or my work or myself as a character as me personally, that is not okay.

People look at me and go, 'He's only successful because he's got a bunch of 16-year-old girls at his back who don't understand comedy.' Well, they do. In any case, no one hates me more than I do; no one's more self-conscious about that than I am.

I don't know whether it's audiences or filmmakers who want characters to be likable today, but I don't think actors are afraid of their characters being unlikable.

When you're in the living room every week for nine years as one character, it's hard for some people to see you as someone else.

People have been afraid of me because of the parts I played. Nobody remembers that I was the dad in 'Free Willy.'

The commercial I did for Kia was hilarious and unexpected, so that, I think, is also another way of signaling to the audience that there's more to me than Morpheus.

I think television is about the characters you want to see again, and so you want to invite these people into your home. And certainly, seeing them get into bad situations and then watching them have to get themselves out, that's always super satisfying.

There's so much more to being a 'top guy' than what you see on screen that I really learned.

In the film industry, you are fictitious, just like the characters you play. It has a lot do with a perception about you, and not necessarily you. You are successful because people like that image of you on screen.

It's not all the time, but you get a sense when you're reading something that it's no longer about boxing or the performance. It's personal.

I do understand my limitations as a fiction writer, which is why my novels are always going to be close to home.

I don't really think about the fact that a lot of people are watching 'DSDS' or about the way I should phrase my sentences.

I could never write a book where the point-of-view character was a short person, because I just can't imagine what that's like.

My personal life is a big part of who my character is.

I let characters be human and flawed and relatable. When we do things that aren't that great, we can understand it.

I've seen my family watch TV every day, and they develop a liking for various characters more and more with time. So, I think TV does bring a celeb closer to his fans. I feel I have come closer to people without losing my raw appeal.

As long as I don't go onstage completely normal and then jump into character onstage, I assume that most fans would be able to accept me as the creator. I can comment on the work the same way a director would on his movie.

The most real characters in a great play are those who are so meticulously drawn that the audience could predict how many pairs of shoes they might have in their closet or how many close friends they had in grade school. Have any of our public figures been as fully developed in the media?

I never think about what people will think when they watch me on screen.