I think there are people, and I do not mean this to be disparaging, there are people like Jay Mohr and Jeremy Piven where they just give you that vibe, 'This guy's going to play someone a little venal.'
People always assume that, if you're an actor who's been on anything from which you're recognisable, that you're making all this money, and it's just not true.
My definition of a character actor is - they never get the girl.
I believe that God felt sorry for actors so he created Hollywood to give them a place in the sun and a swimming pool. The price they had to pay was to surrender their talent.
Being an actor is looked at like a prolonged game of dress-up. America puts movie stars on pedestals. In college, it's the flip side. I sometimes have to justify my job to my professors because they're focused on intellect and ideas.
I went to college and stage school, and thought about acting, but... I just don't like actors very much! They're not as fun as musicians.
I was still thought of as a kid actor even though I was in my mid twenties.
I'm not just an actor born in L.A. I was born in the Griffith Park Hospital. You can't get any more clichéd than that.
Everyone thinks I'm some big drug addict and loser because of the parts I play - quite the opposite. I decided to be a winner.
Somebody saw me on 'Cheers' and thought that I was an actor playing a part as opposed to a guy just doing what he knew. And they gave me 'Night Court.' And by the time they realized I wasn't an actor, I had already signed a five-year contract.
If someone plays a brooding actor in a film, people think they're brooding all the time.
I just think people are so used to seeing me on shows like 'Vampire Diaries' and 'Pretty Little Liars,' which are more geared toward teens. But in reality, I could have a 12-year-old kid.
It took a long time for me to have any impact in the business because I didn't look like an actor, I didn't sound like an actor.
They say God looks after kids and idiots, and I think actors are probably a combination of the two.
It was the fashion of the time, still is, to feel that all actors are neurotic, or they would not be actors.
There are actors who don't get out of their Barbie Doll avatars, but that's not who I am.
Actors often behave like children, and so we're taken for children. I want to be grown up.
Despite what people say about my major film roles, I'm not a dull or monotonous woman searching for self-identity.
For me, personally, I'm a 5'5" leading man. I'm no Brad Pitt or anything.
Everybody thinks that actors would be really good at bluffing, but I think it's a little backward.
Well, I've always been a character actor, you know, and you always get your share of character actors who are bad guys.
I'm a typically lazy person. It is sort of characteristic of actors.
Every actor-performer says this, and it sounds so irritating, but I'm not the most outgoing person.
It's really hard because obviously people label you as a British East Asian actor. And I'm just from Salford; it's where I was born.
When you are in America, at least for me, as an immigrant, I try to be as Americanized as I could. I just want to be an actor, I don't just want to be an Asian actor necessarily.
