Shelley Conn Quotes

You know when you have a party as a kid, and your mom hires a fairy, princess, or superhero to come host the party? I was Fairy Lavender. I loved it. It was good training for theater.

I started taking acting classes when I was 14. That's when I knew I wanted to try it professionally. Before that, I watched movies, always, but I didn't think it was a real job. I watched Turner Classic Movies with my parents. I've always loved the old classics.

My first professional job was with Berkeley Repertory Theatre. I started out in an educational touring play and eventually starred on their stages. That was the theatre that nurtured me to expand as an artist.

It wasn't until I saw 'The Color Purple' on Broadway when I was 15 that I really solidified acting is what I want to do professionally.

I went to New York University to study experimental theatre in 2006 and was there pretty consistently until 2011.

Jayne Houdyshell and I - when I was 17 years old - did summer stock together at the Timber Lake Playhouse in Mt. Carroll, IL. She was the leading lady of the company, and I was an intern.

I play one role until I take on another, which is exactly what a professional actor should do.

Acting is a craft to me: I just think you get better the more you do it. And then the irony to that is your doing it is not in your control. If it was up to most actors, we'd work all the time, and we'd always get better. But it's not in our control, so we have to wait to be given parts to do.

I was studying with Stella Adler, who was a great, great teacher who encouraged me to be an actor. I had thought I would just write or direct or whatever. I wasn't thinking very much of Hollywood. I was thinking only of the legitimate theatre. But then I changed.

I like to play music, and I like to be funny, so I just do both at the same time.

You don't pay an actor to act. An actor will do that for free because we love to act. You pay an actor to wait.

When I started acting professionally, it really felt like an extension of just playing around - it was all very organic.

I really respected women that could sing their tails off and entertain really well, so I wanted to get that across before I brought any of my own music into it.

I got serious about performing, and I got serious about acting. It's very funny; singing has always been a very separate thing for me - until I went to college. I just studied musical theater because I was like, 'That means I can study voice and acting in the same major, and I won't have to double major.' Now I do musicals for a living.

My father had it, my mother had it; we wanted to entertain people.

Because I was writing verse, my instructor suggested I study Shakespeare. The Shakespeare teacher insisted you couldn't understand the text without seeing it on its feet.

I am trained in theatre, and so I take time to study and get into the skin of a character.

I want to mesmerize people. I study dancing, so I use my hands. The people love all that kind of stupid things. So I used the stupid things to teach, to help, to serve, to give a beautiful message of love and peace.

Acting was something I always really wanted to do and, when I left school and was old enough to get an agent, 'Coronation Street' was, like, the thing to get into.

I studied digital arts and graphic design, and then, at the same time I was studying, I was still doing auditions.

I study entertainment and apply it to myself to one day become the greatest WWE superstar we have, and it's a lot of work. So I write jokes and material every day... you have to keep people's attention, one way or another.

Sometimes directors come to me when I have to play some horrible thing, scary or hysterical or crying; they ask, 'Did you study somewhere to be an actress?' No, this is life. That's why I think I don't want to say you need a really bad experience to be a good artist, but bad experiences in your life say something.

I was Boots The Monkey in 'Dora The Explorer Live Dora's Pirate Adventure,' and it was the greatest!

I grew up studying dance, taking ballet lessons.

We all have aspects of ourselves that we my not be aware of. Actors in particular - they have multiple personality disorder. They get paid a lot of money to exhibit that.