Jessica White Quotes

I never do roles, I play people.

With most British actors, it's amazing. I think they start with the character on the outside and work in.

For better or worse, I don't necessarily categorize myself as a method actor; I'm not going to make claims that I stayed in character 24/7.

I don't act in the way other actresses act, in terms of building or creating a character. I don't transform myself into the role, I invest myself in the role.

There are a lot of actors who will sit here and talk to you about characters - 'He does this, and she's a really interesting character because she does this.' I'm not like that at all. I'm not an actory actor.

You take what you know, and you put it through your own prism. If I play characters that break down or cry, it's Gary Oldman crying; it's not the character crying.

I just play him as myself, I don't ease myself into any role really. I stick a beard on and play me.

I've never been a method actress; I've never been that person that wants to imagine horrible things happening in your own life in order to exploit them for your emotional being in the movie. I'm just not good at doing that.

There are some similarities, I think, with all the characters I play. I'm not a guy who sees the desire to transform with each part; I'm not a piece of clay.

I realise that certain actors project their own image onto the screen - those who are the same on as they are off. But I've never had the necessary statistics to be able to do that sort of thing, and so, anyway, I always wanted to be a character actor.

As an actor, you can't just imitate someone. You have to get under her skin.

I believe in method acting. Whenever I'm working on a character, I start behaving like him. I start doing these things which the character would normally do. Maybe that's the way I function as an actor, and I believe in it. And that's how I try and portray a character.

The actor's job is to put themselves in the shoes of the character they are trying to portray as truthfully as possible.

I never really thought I was a method actor or anything like that.

You normally either get bitten by a character and decide that is the way to play it, and then that begins to inform everything you do, or you decide, 'I don't need to use much character in this - I have basically got to be me'.

I appreciate actors who work very hard to get at the truth of the character they're playing. That speaks to me, and I try to protect that process because I value the focus and intention behind it.

I guess because I pay so much attention to the physical part of the character, I don't look upon it as like Charlize Theron up there. I don't think of them as like Charlize Theron films.

As an actor, I think it's always important to separate yourself from your characters because, when you include yourself in a character, you're taking a liberty that you don't really have unless you're life is that incredibly close to the character.

I never really thought about what characters I play. I always just wanted different characters.

A lot of American actors I work with are in character all day long. You can't talk to them. It's Method and the whole thing.

Good acting comes from finding the essence of a character.

As an actor, you're sort of the court-appointed lawyer for the character.

Ultimately, the idea of acting is to understand the people you're playing, and then where they're coming from is not so mystifying. You've got to detox a bit after, though.

When you are developing a character you have to bring so much of yourself to the role.

I like to try to change things up a bit in the way that actors such as Philip Seymour Hoffman or Michael Fassbender did and do.