Erik Estrada Quotes

I don't regret giving up football for acting. I love football and am very proud I played for Morton. But the truth is, I wasn't going to get much higher in football. At the same time, I sensed I could go somewhere in acting. I'm 28, which is young for acting, whereas in football I'd now be near the end of my career.

I was always going to be a dancer - I drifted into acting.

Dumb luck brought on the move from business to acting. I had moved to New York when I was 23, in the year 2000. On a lark, I went to audition for a soap opera.

I went to college in Pittsburgh at Carnegie Mellon University... studied acting there. Then I went to New York for about five years. I moved out here about 10 years ago.

I just spent a lot of time on 'ER' for that eight years. I also started working when I was 16, so by the time I left 'ER,' I was 40 years old, I had this incredible experience, my wife had this great company, we had four kids, it was like, 'Let's go to New York and live for a while and make that the priority.'

When I said I no longer wanted to be a painter, that I wanted to be an actor, the first thing I did was get a stinking job in an insurance building.

I actually wanted to be a police officer like my dad for the longest time, up until my sophomore year in high school when I started doing plays. I did plays when I was little, but in high school, I started getting into acting.

Before I pursued acting full-time, I had every intention of going into some form of law enforcement work.

I never really considered acting as a career until I moved to New York.

I worked with my dad for 15 years. I apprenticed under him and decided I wanted to become an architect. So I went to college for it and then the acting bug got me.

I was pre-med, so I was going to go into the family business, more or less. But I came to my senses, luckily, and backed out, and decided to go to drama school.

I love track and field, but I also know the day will come when I will have to do something else.

I wanted to be a New York City cop before I became an actor.

After three years in Chicago, I decided to call it a career.

I started as a musician. I play the saxophone, but from the age of 17, I realised that it's very hard to make a living as a jazz musician in Australia. So I went for an audition and got an acting job and, fortunately, I completely fell in love with that.

When I grew up I always wanted to act. Also, I wanted to be either a lawyer or a doctor. However, when I got to college and realized what those occupations entailed, I changed my mind real quick.

Yeah, I had actually tried to stop acting before I made Dead Man Walking.

I did nothing but theater until, I guess, '99. I was all the way through college the first time that I had stepped in front of a camera. And it's weird; it's definitely a transition.

Acting has always been a strong force in my life, but it was hard to change direction. I didn't make a paycheck for two years.

I tried to make a distinct point that I wasn't retiring - that I was moving on.

I love my career. I thought, if I was lucky, I would retire as a senior intelligence officer, still working on the issues of counterproliferation. But that didn't happen, so - new chapter.

If I hadn't have fallen pregnant by my then-boyfriend, I would probably still be living in London doing the celebrity scene.

I had started out my grown-up life in New York City, but I couldn't figure out how to be an actor there. And so I had been a magazine illustrator instead.

I finally said, 'I don't care if you're the first person in your family to be a lawyer.' Everybody thought what I was doing was really exciting, but it was not moving me one bit. And that's when I decided to join city government in Chicago, and that changed my life.

I had no intention of being an actor, ever.