Ari Graynor Quotes

My identity started developing through the songs I was writing.

My writing was liberated once I abandoned acting.

Singing and acting suit me. I made a vow to myself to do everything that I can do with this life that I have, and I have to find the time to do this. Sometimes I need to be an actress. Sometimes I don't need to be Jill. However, everyone is always looking for the Jill in everything.

I'd like, each time out as a writer, to reinvent who I am and what I'm doing. That's one of the great pleasures and rewards of the occupation.

We are all born artists... Almost everything kids do is art.

Acting is not my primary drive in life, although I'd be a very unhealthy person without it.

'Tongue' is literally just one piece of the puzzle. This album is something I've worked on over the course of my entire career and something I've been discovering myself in it.

I was not interested in what I could bring to myself by being an actress, but in what I could bring out of myself.

Writing is a subtle art that is reached mostly by self-discovery and experimentation.

I was always really shy. That's why being in front of cameras like this is uncomfortable. I found that when I was a kid, I would hide behind playing pretend. That's when I would come out of my shell. I would dress up as an old man or something and go out onto the street with my mom. I would come out of my shell that way. So I ended up stumbling into acting. It was the one thing that I found a passion for.

Poetry has in a way been my bridge to my acting career. I had so many questions about my life, so I took to poetry to express my questions. I had questions about politics, family relationships, and more.

When we're growing up there are all sorts of people telling us what to do when really what we need is space to work out who to be.

I went into acting as psychotherapy, and it's still a work in progress.

As a kid, I was always very shy growing up - I wasn't very good at articulating my thoughts or my feelings. Now that I'm older, I found acting to do that. So it's been an amazing way to sort of express who I am.

I believe that being an actress or being involved in a movie has to be a life experience, otherwise why go for it? I have to change me, and I have to learn things, and I have to push me and my limits. By acting, I find a freedom inside of a prison in a way.

Acting is the greatest answer to my loneliness that I have found.

In a lot of the art world, you have to present yourself as you know what you're doing at a young age. Music gave me another outlet. The 'no wave' bands were such an inspiration; it felt so free - once you start doing it, it's hard to stop. But I can't get away from art. It comes back around. I wouldn't be true to myself if I didn't pursue it.

For me, 'Rent' was all about coming out of myself, finding out who I was, learning the power I could have as a performer.

Through theater and acting school, I found a way to articulate myself.

Acting was a godsend. I found myself because I loved acting.

I love acting because it's empowering. It empowers me.

If you have to change something about you to be in a part, I don't think it's easy to do. You should just pick the part where you can just be yourself.

It's a great challenge and a wonderful journey how to figure out how to be an artist and to carve my way.

Well, you know, it's been interesting because an album is just a snapshot of where you are at that time. Not all pictures of everybody are just in jeans and a 'T' shirt, or a ball gown. You have many different sides and this is a snapshot of where you are at that time.

Making art has never been a mystery to me. It's never been something that's very difficult.