Bruce Dern Quotes

I like most of the Humphrey Bogart movies because they had to act then, and they acted very well. Edward G. Robinson is probably the best actor I've ever seen on the movies.

There is a difference between movie actors and TV acting, especially with movie stars, which is they know their face is 20 feet high on the screen. They know they don't have to do much.

When I think of character actors, I think of Spencer Tracy; I think of Gene Hackman, Robert Duvall. When I was a young lad watching films, my eyes were on them - watching 'On the Waterfront,' my eyes are on Rod Steiger and Karl Malden, not on Brando.

Look, every actor has a different way of preparing or creating a character and yeah, we all are from different backgrounds.

Actors aren't all the same. They have very different skills. There are actors of intellect who are very thoughtful about everything they do... and then there are actors of instinct who don't know what they're doing until the cameras roll... My father was actually quite thoughtful about what he did, while my mother was much more instinctual.

I always felt that Bette Davis was one of the great screen actresses who never really got her due - she won two Oscars, but the last was in 1938, and that was really before all the great work that she did.

One role blends into the next role. I mean, there's strange idiosyncrasies from roles that I play that I picked up that will never go away.

I mean, the actors that I admired were Marlon Brando, Montgomery Clift, an actress named Barbara Harris. And Greta Garbo. They were great actors.

On the stage you develop a character that's different from yourself. In a film they're always saying, 'Walk over here. Say this line. Be you.'

Take characters that Nicholson or De Niro play: they're not always tough.

The face of Garbo is an Idea, that of Hepburn an Event.

There's no such thing as The Method. The term 'method-acting' is so much nonsense. There are many methods, many techniques.

I could never understand the attraction of Bette Davis. I always preferred Jane Russell.

'Whatever it takes' is my opinion of method acting and, indeed, any other kind of acting. Look at Brando and De Niro. But it's not my cup of tea.

Actors will change their face, will change their hair, will change their voice, will disappear into the role. A movie star doesn't disappear.

My favourite actors have always been the character actors.

I was very entertained by Betty Grable and Judy Garland.

I was in a movie with Marlon Brando. Now, I didn't have any scenes with Marlon Brando, but I had scenes with Martin Sheen and was around Dennis Hopper, who was a child actor in the studio system and was enamored of James Dean, as was Martin, and they were all sort of disciples of Brando.

Acting is a state of being, and the camera can tell instantly if you're lying. But there are many different ways to approach that state of being. Each director has his own approach to the situation, and that's really interesting.

There is an art to acting, and there are techniques that are acquired. You can be as emotional as you'd like, as a person, but figuring out ways that you can bring specific emotions at specific times and have them be true, and relating to someone as someone that they're not, is a lot.

I'm not a method actor. The techniques that I follow have been created and practiced in my own journey, ones that I have researched, formed and invented.

By the way, everybody approaches acting differently. Like, I'm kind of sloppy and I like it kind of loose. I like to kind of play around. Some people don't.

I feel that when it comes to acting, Shahid and I approach roles differently.

It's a real challenge to have someone perform a character vs. imitate a character.

You have to be very specific on the technical part of the acting.