Acting Preparation Quotes

In terms of preparation, if there's some historical context that's needed, I do like to read a lot. Working on Joe Kennedy for 'Boardwalk,' I read a couple of biographies on him. It's nice to have a broader context of the man outside of where the show is coming from.

The way I prepare is through script analysts and back story. I create back story for a character based on script analysts, filling in as many details as possible. I also do a lot of research.

I always wanted to be an actor, so I began to prepare myself for a career in acting. I did a course at Kishore Namit Kapoor's acting school. I was with Shiamak Davar's dance school and also did theatre with Nadira Babbar.

It all started with the most basic level of Uta Hagen, right at the beginning. I'm like, 'Really? I came to grad school; I'm going to do the 'Respect for Acting'?' And I realized the importance of that, because it was really to just get you to get rid of everything. Get rid of everything you've learned and just start from the bottom up.

I had an edge in 'Andhadhun' because, being a musician, I knew how to play a guitar, so it was not difficult for me to learn a musical instrument.

A lot of actors talk about doing their homework, but very few of them do it.

There's a small percentage of people who can act. There's a small percentage who get to do this for a living. There's a swath of the population that are able to keep a story in their head and fight all the battles against self-consciousness and the surreal unnaturalness of acting in a movie. The technical aspects you can learn fairly quickly.

It doesn't matter if it's a drama or a comedy, the need to get the emotion and the character arc across is way harder in something like this so was more of a preparation.

I always tell Asian actors, especially Filipinos wanting to break into Hollywood, to study, study and study and show their best. I haven't stopped studying. There's an abundance of roles, and all you have to do is prove to them that you are good for the role.

One of the first speaking roles I had was in a film called 'Svengali', with Peter O'Toole and Elizabeth Ashley. I was a waiter, and I had about three lines. And I was ready! I had been around people like that, and I knew they were just actors. All the work I had done, it was all there, and I felt like I knew all the mechanics.

I love those preliminary conversations about who a character is. You try on wigs, shoes, and clothes. It's preferable when it's not about looking pretty. It can get a little dull to just be cute.

When you're first reading the script and thinking about playing the part, it's slightly daunting. It's easy to question, 'Is an audience going to like me? And is that my job?'

I didn't have to audition. That's common, but it had never happened to me before. Normally, I hate auditioning. I need to stew and think... let the character develop and grow inside me.

I do believe that you have to bring some degree of truth from yourself to the role [Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street ]in and I'll admit it here, I have shaved a grown man before. I have done it. And it wasn't Tim [Burton].

There are only three reasons to do a movie: the cast, the director, the role. Like I say, you live in a minute of screen time, but to prepare for the minute takes much more than a day. You'd better be excited about what those moments are, even if they're the hardest moments. Or the smallest.

I really love the karate thing I did on CHIPs. I studied with a trainer because I knew we'd do episodes that had karate.

A lot of actors know they want to be actors a little bit earlier on. I didn't even really start studying until I was about 22.

The only thing that's required of an actor for an audition is to memorize your sides with confident choices, and then the rest is not up to you. You're either right for a part or you're not.

I volunteered at a homeless shelter in preparation for 'Being Flynn,' and when I'm walking along the Bowery, that's the first thing that comes to mind. That's a nice memory.

I had a really fantastic dialect coach that I worked very well with, and I was constantly surprised by the different intonations that the Russian dialect has.

I had been asked to start going out for roles here and there throughout my career, but I know that acting is a hard thing; it takes a lot of work, and I was traveling. I didn't have the time to really focus on it, so I really waited for the right project to come along.

I am a professional actor, and I am very careful about being sincere to the characters I play.

I kept turning down roles because I knew I just wasn't ready for them.

It's stressful to keep doing audition after audition after audition. You finish one and go to the next one, and you have to learn lines. For me, I have to work on my accent, so I was getting accent coaching and acting coaching. I wanted to make good impressions.

When I'm playing a character, I don't wear perfume.