Constantin Stanislavski Quotes

Any actor who tells you that they have become the people they play, unless they’re clearly diagnosed as a schizophrenic, is bullshitting you.

I'm fascinated with actors, and I've never quite understood the process.

I think that different actors go about their preparation differently, but when it comes to acting, I use my imagination.

Yes, Pluton, actually, in the play. And I play him in my most stentorian voice.

People often argue about this. Obviously one of the skills in performance is acting, and you can't expect every Romeo to really be in love with their Juliet!

It's true what people say - that actors are the closest thing there is to children. They play.

Good acting is confused with good dialogue delivery. Acting is about all about performance, and the way we interpret and understand the character that we bring alive onscreen.

As an actor, you generally want to see the other actor's face.

It's just an impulse, in some actors. You want to make the audience like you. That's the aim of the exercise.

Denzel [Washington] just knows the actor. He knows the process, and you don't often get that.

I'm an actor - I want to be known for that.

I'm not one of those actors that goes to watch the playback, after every take. I really don't like it, and I don't want to see it.

All that back-story stuff doesn't help. What you get paid for is to stand toe-to-toe with the other actor and get him to do your will.

When I was very small, I had that first-time-you-see-a-play experience, which immediately made me want to act, because it seemed like this incredible outlet for something I was already doing fairly compulsively anyway, which was putting on hats and costumes and doing funny voices. It was a very natural compulsion for me.

It was one of those plays in which all of the actors unfortunately enunciated very clearly.

One of the things you learn at drama school is not to play the result, but just to play the moment.

I'm not a method actor. I can't even explain so much what I do.

That's the thing about prep, is that it's a joy to have it there and you can spend all this time prepping, but ultimately you have to look at your script and turn up on the day. It's embedded in there somewhere but you have to forget it all and play the scene because we are storytelling.

I think if you play characters, it's very important not to ever tag them with any sort of disorder, or diagnose them, or whatever. You have to normalize the behavior to get inside the character.

That's the thing about acting - it does have the feeling of downhill skiing. When it's really all going right, you know your lines, you know what's important to your character, you pick the strongest reactions possible to elements in the story. But then you let it all go and you're in the moment and stuff happens. It surprises you and it's super strong; it's like you're living life in a slightly heightened way in the time between "action" and "cut."

You have to be so confident and so gifted to fill five minutes of nothing at the very beginning of a play before even a word is uttered.

I got cast in a school play and I fell in love with that. I felt comfortable on stage and found out it was a brilliant way of expressing myself and I was happy and I could do it.

When you're acting you always want to come across as if you're not acting. For me, my take is always to have it feel like you're watching someone on film and that comes with a lot of preparation time.

I insist that they do what they became actors to do. I want them to create something and not just hit marks and say words. So they all love that because they're playing. It's called playacting. Their contributions are not only welcomed, but are accepted and used.

I admire the actors that truly can impersonate someone - become someone, inhabit someone. It's amazing when you see it done.