Michael Shannon Quotes

I like to play people that are real, a real person, and then something that's interesting with that person. I think it's a lot more challenging to do that than something that's extremely fantasy-like.

I think every role you take on, you should take on the responsibility of doing the best representation of that person or that character or that role. When it is a human being that has actually existed, and it is a person that people know of, yeah, you feel an even more amount of pressure to do a good job.

You're playing a character in a drama who happens to be based on someone who existed. It's never going to 'be' that person, but it's based on someone well-known, and you want to create enough of that person for it not to be a distraction.

Acting is not acting. It isn't putting on a face and dancing around in a mask. It's believing that you are that character and playing him as if it were a normal day in the life of that character.

I don't think you can ever completely transform yourself on film, but if you do your job well, you can make people believe that you're the character you're trying to be.

When you play someone who is an iconic figure you can't go into it lightly.

That's, to me, the ultimate goal - to disappear inside another character and bring them so fully to life that I've convinced other human beings that it's a real person.

There's a lot of traps you can fall into when you are playing someone who existed. If it comes out just as impersonation, that's bad; it has to be an embodiment. You have to live it, not just sound and look like it.

When you're portraying someone, whether they're real or fictional, you have to find some kind of hook where it feels real to you because if you don't believe it yourself, then no one else is going to believe it.

I think that acting involves doing your job so well that you are able to help the viewer identify with the character.

I know there's been a lot that's been said about animated voice work, as though it's 'you can do this in your jeans and there's no camera and no pressure there. It's no big deal. It's easy.' The truth is, it's really a great test: how deep is your ability is to access your imagination?

With singing, the name of the game is to make yourself believable. When somebody hears you sing a song, and they say, 'Oh, that must have happened to him,' that's when you know you're transmitting. It's like being a good actor. You make people feel things, emotions and what not.

There is always pressure playing a real living person and even pressure developing a character from scratch.

That's precisely what we do as actors: try to convince the audience we are somebody else. And if you can do that, you are really doing something.

I hate acting when I see it. I don't want to feel it, I don't want to see it, I want to be taken away with the story - I don't want the actor's ego in front of me. That's what I try to live when I do the work.

When you're playing a real person, there's a balance between playing the person in the script and playing the person as he was in life. You have to be respectful and true to who that person was, but at the same time tell the story in the film.

How do I act so well? What I do is I pretend to be the person I'm portraying in the film or play.

With any part you play, there is a certain amount of yourself in it. There has to be, otherwise it's just not acting. It's lying.

I mean, I do believe that when you walk on the stage, or onto the screen, that's your character - not you. So it's an interesting challenge, an interesting line to walk.

I'm lucky that people believe me when I'm in character.

If I have anything to offer as an actor, it's only my ability to make the person real.

You draw on whatever's relevant to the part you're playing; it makes it more personal.

The closer a part is to you, the harder it is to play. Anything else is just imitation. If I'm playing a Russian countess, I get the hat, the accent, the outrageousness. Easy. Playing a murderess? Perfect.

There are actors who are really fantastically talented at being natural on screen and appearing to be themselves, but I like the challenge of becoming somebody else.

I think the biggest compliment an actor can have is if people forget who they're watching and get lost in the character.