Ben Mendelsohn Quotes

Being an actor is really, really hard, no matter how you slice it.

Being an actor in L.A. is like being in prison: you go, you serve your time, you try to replicate Johnny Depp's career - and then you move to Paris.

There are so many talented young actors in the industry. I'm just happy to have a job!

I recognize how lucky I am as an actor. I've been working as an actor since I was 9 years old.

I've been very lucky and been able to work, as an actress, but I'm definitely a working actress. I get a script, I audition, and then I pray.

By the time 'Suits' had come around, I had been acting for maybe six years. 'Deal or No Deal' - I like to call it my very lucrative waitressing job. Most actors find a way to make a living while they're auditioning, and for me, holding a briefcase was an incredibly lucrative means of being able to pursue what I really wanted to do.

Everyone's amazed by the question that how did I succeed as an actor in the industry, which has Kamal Haasan? It's because I grew as an actor watching Kamal's acting.

Once the second season of 'Haven' rolled around, I really started to attack this acting thing and finally admitted, 'OK, I'm an actor now. This is what I'm doing. This is my new career.'

I'm a working actor, and I want to stay a working actor, and I want everybody happy.

I think most actors don't start out wanting to be either a lead or a character actor. You just really want to work, whatever manifestation that takes.

I'm a character actress, plain and simple... Who can worry about a career? Have a life. Movie stars have careers - actors work, and then they don't work, and then they work again.

I was never a struggling actor, for which I feel very blessed.

I have no complaints with the whole childhood acting thing, because I wanted to do it.

As an actor, I'm always just so pumped when I get any job. To be a working actor takes a lot of luck.

It's a very odd thing with Hollywood, where you do stand-up, you're good at it, then they go, 'How would you like to be a horrible actor?' Then you say, 'All right, that sounds good. I'll do that.'

I hope I have quite a few great roles to come.

I'm very grateful and fully aware that 90 percent of actors are not working. Going from public school teacher to a show like 'Grey's Anatomy', I love what I do.

When I wanted to be an actress, I never wanted really to be the kind of actress I became.

I'd love to start doing some films and really kind of pursue acting as much as possible. That's really where my main focus is.

I gave up a long time ago trying to figure out what will happen in an acting career.

I've been an actor for 20 years, and I think the first 14 years, it was all struggling. At first, it was all gangsters.

I'm just so glad that I started acting when I did because I had this wealth of life experience. I don't know if I'd have been able to handle it had I gone out to L.A. at 22.

I had agents in Australia; I just never had any auditions. And if you can't audition, then you can't work. I studied there. I did classes there. I learned how to act. Growing up there, I discovered my love for acting, but I just wasn't getting the opportunities to work professionally.

When I first auditioned for 'Stranger Things,' I was just living in Chicago. Just looking for a job. Working at a restaurant, doing commercials and bit parts on shows. I honestly would have been happy booking anything.

Mother was so good that I was defeated even before I started to be an actress. I thought I could never make it unless I spent years in the Actors Studios, went on the blacklist and lived in New York, as she did.