Natalie Portman Quotes

For me, I've always taken being on a set as my school, because I've been working since I was ten.

I have been working since I was 11 on everything including period dramas.

I'd say that kids working on sets, even if it's Bambi, need to be allowed to be kids, even if they're working, not become little adults - that to me can be distorting to kids as an experience.

I was in Minnesota, where I was born, and I did print ads and commercials. And that was always cool 'cause when you're little, you can only work two hours a day, and it changes.

When I do a movie, that's just a couple months out of my year and out of my life. All the other months I'm just at home, running around doing errands with my mom and going to sleepovers. I feel like I have that side of my life, and then I also do the films - which is just sort of a plus.

Filming is a very adult world, and you need to be with people your own age.

I can't say I was unhappy as a child actor in films. I had a particularly wonderful time.

When I was younger and in primary school, I'd do maybe a film a year, and I had to adapt to being away from everyone for a couple of months.

I didn't really start doing stuff until I was 8 or so, but I was an extra in a bunch of different movies, and I just really took to it and really enjoyed it. I kind of bugged my parents to give L.A. a shot, and they were just super-supportive.

In all honesty I think that I've had a very normal life, even though I've been making movies since I was 9.

Whenever I wasn't in school with a tutor three hours a day, I'd get a knock and be rushed to set and they'd be waiting and I'd film my thing and then I'd go back to school again.

People have different expectations when you're younger - it's less about changing yourself into a character; they want a more natural thing. And they just want you to be able to turn up every day and carry on working. They have a horrible fear of 10- or 11-year-olds, that they're going to say 'I don't want to play today.'

I worked in SRK and Salman Khan's films as a child artiste, so Bollywood has always been on my radar.

When I was little, I didn't know you got paid for acting. My parents put the money in the bank for me, but I just thought it was this fun thing that I was so excited to do. You got to be on the set and get a little bit of makeup and be on camera.

'Superbad' was my first movie, but I've been acting since I was seven.

If you're a kid in Southern California, somebody - whether it's you or your parents - somebody throws your hat into the ring and I think everyone had a commercial or two.

My first paying job was guest starring in 'Touched By An Angel' when I was 12. It was very exciting. I couldn't believe you got free food all day and people were so nice to you.

A lot of people don't like child actors.

Growing up on set, the director is the person that, as a child, you admire and gives you validation.

My mom, who was a constant fixture at work with me until I was 18 years old, did an amazing job filtering out all the things a kid didn't need to see or hear on film sets. So, acting was just a fun, breezy, extracurricular activity for me.

I think acting is my destiny. I did my first film when I was just eight. However, I never took that role seriously.

I was in 'The Postman Always Rings Twice' with Jack Nicholson. That was fun. I think I made, like, $33 or something. I got to miss a whole day of school, and when you're a little kid, that's cool.

I was very conscious of the film industry - a lot of people, neighbors, worked in it. I actually grew up doing a bit of extra work myself. I was homeschooled, and it was a way that I could make money. My parents let us do these jobs, and I never got very far, but I was much more interested in what everybody else was doing, and I liked being on set.

When I was nine years old, I was in a movie called, 'Landlord' with Pearl Bailey, Lou Gossett, and Beau Bridges.

As a kid, I just was a contract player at MGM Studios. They put me into goodness knows how many different roles.Some of them were wonderful and some of them were very just distasteful and awful because I was playing out of my age range and I was thoroughly uncomfortable, let's put it that way. So it took me many years to find my acting feet.