Jason Bateman Quotes

It's really rare to come across a character, a show, or a movie that allows you to completely play four or five different characters within a season, let alone a week.

As actors, we want to choose somebody who has conflicts. I can't be always playing the girl next door. What's the challenge in that?

The chance to play a character with a split personality is an actor's dream.

You have to be brave and not always play likeable people. It's difficult, because there's a demand for the hero or heroine to be very likeable.

Basically, I only play one character; I just play him at different volumes.

As an actor, my job is not to always play characters who make everybody happy. That's not interesting.

I think people need to understand the amount of emotions I can pull off. I want films I'm offered to have these dimensions.

I can't imagine not playing Wynonna, because I get to play so many different things. In any given episode, I get drama and comedy and horror and all the notes of life, and very few shows or movies give you that opportunity.

The very first things that I did, even in theater, were bad guys. They are meaty roles for the most part. With the bad guy you have more freedom to experiment and go further out than with a good guy.

As an actor, I'm constantly striving to find the darkness in the lighter characters and the lightness in the darker characters.

I don't like to repeat myself as an actor.

I've had some marvelous parts, but I'm also asked to play characters who are kind of superficial people.

For me, I'm always looking for the opportunity for a character that challenges me and lets me play two for the price of one.

Usually I'm frustrated when I look at my films and I don't believe that I've made a real transformation beyond my usual sets of gestures and expressions. I still have this nagging feeling that it's me, that I didn't create a unique character.

I continue to be known as a guy that plays really complex, three-dimensional characters.

The ability to stretch my range into all genres and characters is something I take great pleasure in doing. I thoroughly enjoy it. I consider myself a character actor, though some think of me as a leading man. As an actor, I love shifting gears from character to character, and the more range I can expand, the better.

With 'Richard,' I was excited to make this film with such an amazing role for an actor. Play a wide range of emotion and really invest myself in the character.

The work evolves when you get another part, and then you're getting called on to solve difficult characters, to inject a note of humanity into them. It's more interesting for me to do that than to stand around and be sunny.

Every actor has to love and loathe the character he plays.

I think that's what I really liked about Narc: My character has a real operatic range in a way that older movies used to have.

'Everwood' I think provides a unique feeling, an emotional experience. And other shows on TV don't have the acting talent to do that. Each one of our actors can do a serious scene and a humorous scene, and can do it all within the same sequence. They can go from a heartbreaking moment to a humorous moment.

I find that comedy is my specialty, but drama is slowly starting to move up in that rank. I've always liked playing a character that has depth and that I'm able to bring my own niche to.

As an actor, you don't want to play a one-dimensional character.

Long scenes of emotion are quite difficult - you've got to build up to them and make sure you're in the right emotional space.

I have a tendency as an actress in general to ground my characters. Even when doing outlandish characters, that's my instinct.