Robert De Niro Quotes

When you are developing a character you have to bring so much of yourself to the role.

I wouldn't say I'm a Method actor, but there are times where a role will require you to live in their world.

I find that I kind of have to sink into the character.

When I do a character, I try to base it on someone I have met or an experience I've had.

I always try to make each character my own.

The way I approach acting when there's a real life character, it's sort of like a Venn diagram. What I come up with is some amalgam of the two of us.

You can say to actors that you've got to be the character and really get into it, but you have to make it realistic by bringing an element of yourself into it.

I learned to understand the distance a character can be from yourself and how important rehearsal can be to creating a person that feels like a person that isn't you.

You've got to bring yourself to any character you do.

Once you're playing someone, you shouldn't be judging them in any way. That's what being an actor is - it's having empathy for people that are different from yourself. Once you've committed to that person, your responsibility is to tell that story.

I do enter into character on set, but I can step out of it.

With any character, you have to put part of yourself into it because we are the soul that brings that character to life.

I'm not the kind of actor who goes into exhaustive research for each role.

If you can just actually let the character be for a bit, then you get the right sense.

I don't act in the way other actresses act, in terms of building or creating a character. I don't transform myself into the role, I invest myself in the role.

Yeah, I think the common denominator - and this is probably going to sound like Acting 101 - but the common denominator is belief in the character in the moment.

That's what acting is. You're pretending to be someone else.

You want to try and bring a character to life in an honest a way as you possibly can. It doesn't matter whether he's a doctor, an actor, a car salesman or a captain of a starship. If you can bring truth and honesty to that character, then your audience will believe you.

Preparation is definitely important, but it depends on the kinds of roles I do. Like, I completely identify with my character in 'Yeh Jawaani Hai Deewani.' I had to be myself and I didn't have to actually prepare for it.

I take my time to get into the mindset of the character and say my lines. I really have to be the person that I am playing.

It's hard to actually take details from your personal life and apply them a scene because, as much as you can identify with a feeling, you just get muddled. As soon as you start bringing your own stuff in, it's like, 'No, that's not right.' You're playing a different person. You can relate, but you have to leave that stuff at the door.

As actors, you play people who are not yourselves!

Actors pull from their own experiences to bring reality to the characters. I wouldn't want to play someone who's a lot like me. There would be no turning it on or off.

Some actors can distance themselves from the parts they play, but I fall into the category who use bits of themselves.

I think when you play a role, you always have to be a defense attorney for that character.