Andy Kaufman Quotes

I don't believe actors who say they don't bleed into their characters. It's absolutely impossible not to.

I don't approach my character in a set pattern. I want to get into the skin of the character. I don't love Manoj Bajpayee; I love all my characters. And that is why people today remember all my roles.

I'm much more character based. I try to just be really committed to what I'm doing.

There is never a personal-life connection between my characters and myself. I'm a professional and I can access what I need to access, so there's no bleed-over. I didn't need to believe in aliens to play Mulder. As for my personal life, everything is fantastic right now.

It's fashionable for modern actors to talk about getting 'inside' a character. But you can't get to the inside without getting the outside right first.

It's always nice when someone says that they don't realize it's me on screen, but it would be strange to enter a one story while thinking of another character I do, which is completely different.

The point of acting is to hide yourself and get lost in character. To play the same character in eighteen movies would be defeating the purpose I believe so I try to keep a little bit of diversity.

I would love to do a period piece. That would be really cool. And also like to do something transformative and have to transform yourself physically to become that character. Any interesting, fun roles, I'm attracted to.

Nothing comes easy when I'm in character, because everything I do in character, I take seriously.

I never like to go out of character when filming starts. I fear that if I do, I might not be able to pick it up again.

The delineation between the actor and his part is a practical matter. When the camera runs, you want the actor to be the character.

When you're playing a character, you don't really want to have an opinion about where you're going to end up. Otherwise, you can't really stay in the moment and in your character.

I don't think a lot of people really understand the commitment it takes to being a character that an actor in Hollywood would take to approaching a role that they're doing.

Certain people do need to stay in character the whole time, and that's just what they require as a person.

I'm sure there's pieces of me in all the characters I play.

It becomes more and more popular to call actors who play characters "character actors." But I've always been somebody who is much more invested in who I am playing than how they look.

I love people like Renée Zellweger who aren't afraid to look unattractive and really put themselves into a character role and to really be an actress instead of just thinking "Am I on-screen pouting and looking beautiful?" because that's not really what it's about.

I surprised myself, that I was in the tissue of the character enough, that I could actually come up with something that I didn't actually feel or didn't believe.

For me the costume is always a huge part of getting into character.

In my theater days I assumed that you had to get rid of yourself to do a character well, and I don’t think I was a very good actor when I did that.

I know there are a lot of people who like to get very involved in their characters, but I, personally, find it too involved. I just like to do it as a job - and it's my job to make it look real.

I think actors always like to think they don't bring the character home, and then their family all laugh and tell you otherwise.

My fun as an actor and my task as an actor is to transform myself to become other people. I enjoy becoming characters but I don't enjoy becoming caricatures. The research I do is only necessary in so far as we move into other dimensions.

Acting, it's the disappearance of self, disappearance of your own needs and your own wants and the kind of embracing of the character that makes it work.

The actor must know that since he, himself, is the instrument, he must play on it to serve the character with the same effortless dexterity with which the violinist makes music on his. Just because he doesn't look like a violin is no reason to assume his techniques should be thought of as less difficult.