Denis Leary Quotes

My own personal process with movies is to develop the characters with the actors and, when I've done that properly, you can't imagine anyone else, but that actor, playing that part.

Good actors are a dime a dozen, but I want actors that are gonna be part of my team and collaborative.

When they're good, I like working with new actors.

Some directors cast you because they trust you to do the performance - but then they forget to direct you.

When someone pitches a joke for a character that is just perfect, and you can imagine that actor reading that line at your table read or on the set, it's like the sound of a snap snapping into place.

One of those things that I like about TV is that if you get a group of people you like, you can work with these people for months at a time, and you can discover their strengths and weaknesses, and you can use those in the direction where you take the characters.

What was really wonderful about the 'Doubtfire' shoot is that we had this really long rehearsal period in the beginning. That was a great time to get to know each other. We got to know each other and to create the family vibe. So we really didn't have to force it.

I would really love to direct one day. I think there are certain actors who love the character and the performance and that's all they want to be a part of.

I would love to play Lee in 'True West' and Bobby in 'Company.'

The most important thing, when playing characters with chemistry, is being able to work off the other actor and be supported.

I consider it an actor going to work with other actors. It's not a competitive sport, it's not to outact anybody else, sorta thing, you can be a bad actor but you don't outact anybody, you just bring your character as best as you can.

I realize how much I rely on the actors to really know the lines because I tend to forget what they are exactly, even though I've written them. I don't have them memorized. But when it's going well, there is that point where the actor starts to know more about the character than I do.

I love actors. I love working with actors. I really enjoy the process. I love having those in-depth discussions about the interior of their character, and actors really love to discuss that too.

When you work with a good actor, there is this natural rapport and chemistry that develops over time. That chemistry helps your characters come alive and makes the story of the film that much more convincing.

I think that comes with a collaboration with the writers. I think that we get cast in edgier roles because we are a little more offbeat, so people - as we get to know the writers, and as the writers get to know us, they start to write around us more, and that's why I think the pilot is not always the best way to get to experience a new television show, because we're fitting ourselves into these characters. Whereas as the show evolves, they're writing the characters for us and for our strengths and weaknesses.

I'm not the writer who says, "You have to say it exactly as I wrote it," because you don't get good work. You want somebody who's going to bring something interesting to it and really create a character with you. You see that with certain actors.

Nothing is worse for me, as an actor, than when I walk on a set and the director goes, "Okay, you're going to be standing here, the other person is going to be standing here, and you're going to move to there and then do the scene." That doesn't help actors.

I'm an actor and I love to find new collaborations and new characters where I can grow as an actor and human being.

I had a really nice time on [Alphas]. It was a bunch of really good actors, and I was particularly thrilled to be working with David Strathairn.

We would choreograph [ with Paul Dano] before each scene [in Swiss Army Man] and very quickly got to a place where we could improvise physically in scene and know that the other person would respond in character appropriately. So that [dynamic] was a lot of fun.

It makes it easier, if you can't do an American accent. I don't know. It's different. I played a character in Never Let Me Go where the script for my character was very sparse, and I enjoyed it. With Never Let Me Go, I had a whole book written from my character's point of view, so I always knew where I was. But, with Ryan [Gosling], it was just easy. He's such a brilliant actor and he is so prepared. He doesn't have to warm himself up to be in a scene. He's just in it. It draws you in, in a way.

I was on Stargate: Atlantis for four years, playing a similar character called Ronon, who was an alien that didn't say much and grunted. I've been there and done that. Whether people have seen it or not, you want to stretch. And then, while I waited, I got The Red Road, and I'd never gotten anything like that.

The truth is these characters [of Batman story] evolve, and there's a lot of hands in the supporting of these characters. It's great when everybody can know where everything came from. It's important for the legacy of them.

I'm not a comedian. I don't do stand-up. I don't tell jokes. I'm a comedic actor, and approach my work that way. The comedy comes through the character.

Writers get to know me very well. It always serves me in the end because I feel I have a deeper understanding of the character and sometimes they really like my ideas and they use them.