Laura Linney Quotes

I've still got lots of writing in me. I have not left journalism, but I put it on hold to focus on acting. I love actors. I think it's a crazy thing to do with your life, and I have a tremendous amount of respect for them.

Actors love to act all those death scenes.

As a writer, all you want to do is write for great actors. That's all.

As an actress, I always felt like the people you met on set were interchangeable with the people you met on other sets - the grips, the gaffers, the actors, the directors - everybody steps into their role.

In films you do a scene, you play around with it and unless you're doing a lot of reshooting, which no one has the luxury to do, you deal with the problem for a day and then you move on. On some level, it never allows you to go very deep into what performing is about.

I love novels, but I'm not a novelist. I'm just a dramatist, which means I write lines for actors. That's all I have ever wanted to do.

As actors, you play people who are not yourselves!

As an actor, I love working with directors. As much as I love working with other actors.

I've been interested in the writing/directing thing and really fell into acting by complete accident.

I think, basically, I am an actor. Sometimes I'm an actor who's writing and sometimes an actor who's directing, but I think if I'm forced to fill out a form for my tax return, 'actor' is the first thing I write down.

I love acting, every job is a dream job when you're an actor. I'd like to do eventually more film work and to collaborate with the best actors and directors in film.

I would love to direct an 'Apes' movie. It would be in the spirit of where I'm going with my career - avatars played by actors to say something about the human condition.

In the first place, it's surreal to watch filming, to see the little ideas you had in your head and now Taylor Kitsch is doing it, or Salma Hayek. And then to see it loud and bright onscreen is a trip.

Lots of things are hard work, but I think writing, for me, after I started acting at 13 years old. I like writing now much more than I do acting only because, well, partly because the scripts that are offered are junk.

I'm a dramatist, so I really always wrote and directed at the same time because when I wrote something, I always put it on its feet. So I'm in love with actors; I always loved actors.

When the script is finished, and you're sitting around at a table read, and all the actors are reading the words that you've written, and you're hearing it out loud for the first time, that is always, every single time, no matter what, a magical process.

When you're an actor, you get your ideas from everywhere - even from someone on the street. We're total thieves!

There's nothing more thrilling than watching great actors say things that you wrote and bring them to life.

I like scripts. I spend a lot of time writing them.

I'm one of those actors who finds the part in the wardrobe.

I've always admired actors such as Tabu, Nandita Das and Shabana Azmi and I'd like to do the kind of roles that they have done.

Good actors can tell you more about your play than 1,000 hours alone at your desk.

I love working with actors. I love to see what they're going to do. There's just something very thrilling and satisfying with being involved with something, all the way through the process [making movie].

Once you start working with a particular actor, that actor becomes very present in your mind as your mind as you're writing subsequent episodes.

You really have to get out of an actor's head to write because actors only care about their part and it revolves around their part so "This is the important part because this is the part where..." .