theater influence Quotes

Basically, my socialization as a child didn't come from any schooling; it came from being in theater and meeting people online.

When I was about 12, I saw Mark Rylance do this play in New York City called 'Jerusalem' and that really changed the game for me.

There's this weird kind of coming-in-from-left-field thing going on, and I love it - I am a huge fan of Christopher Durang.

I don't watch a lot of my work. I'm not really interested in seeing it after I do it. Because I came from theater, where, you know, it's impossible to actually review your work, so why would I bother under any other circumstances?

For my rock band, I was influenced by things like 'The Rocky Horror Picture Show.' For me, it's live rock n' roll theater.

I know it affected me when I saw certain actors growing up. I had a drama teacher that would take us to see plays in New York, and it was seeing James Earl Jones and Raul Julia - I mean, this guy comes from the place my mother comes from. He's doing Shakespeare right now, and it doesn't seem to matter that he has an accent.

Being somebody who's like a theater geek that I am, I can just go right back to Aeschylus and Euripides and Sophocles: they were writing about gods and goddesses versus humans, and how gods could distort, pervert, or help people get what they want.

First I wanted to be an ice skater, and then I saw 'Bye, Bye Birdie,' and everything changed. I'm glad I learned through the process of theater.

My first exposure to TV, film, theater, the idea of what acting was, is I was a little kid, and my mom's best friend was a local casting director in Cambridge, Mass. Her name was Patty Collinge.

Theater is the foundation of how I live my life, actually. My father was a playwright, so I was around it all the time and loved to talk shop with him, just loved it. And basically everything that I hold to be good and true and worthy, I learned in the theater. So not even just about the work, but just about life. Discipline, problem solving, creativity, how to get along with people.

The person whose work introduced me to the craft was Lorraine Hansberry. The person who taught me to love the craft was Tennessee Williams. The person who really taught me the power of the craft was August Wilson, and the person who taught me the political heft of the craft was Arthur Miller.

I first wanted to be an actress after seeing a play - not a movie.

Would Hamlet have felt the delicious fascination of suicide if he hadn't had an audience, and lines to speak?

Having been a theater person first, you have the whole character, and you see the arc of the character in a play. And then when you do a movie, you have the whole character - or, if it's a small role, there's not much arc, but you see what the whole part is.

I began writing for theater, and maybe because of that I've always thought of myself as a theater writer who does work in film sometimes.

My dad was a theater designer, and I spent a lot of time hanging around the dressing room listening to whatever the actors were listening to, which is where I heard Pink Floyd for the first time.

All of a sudden we were going on school trips, seeing these amazing plays by the likes of Samuel Beckett. My whole world went from 'This is really fun' to 'This is fascinating to me'.

I have always wanted to work in the theater. I've always felt the glamour of being backstage and that excitement, but I've never actually done it - not since I was in 5th grade, really. But I've had many plays in my films. I feel like maybe theater is a part of my movie work.

I'm obviously very keen on the theater and I think it's inevitable that some of the orchestral and chamber pieces have got dramatic elements which might even suggest an unspecified dramatic plot of some kind or other, even though it's not in my mind at the time.

Chorus Line' opened things up a bit. Any show that's successful does that. But 'Chorus Line' was about dancers.

I want people to leave the theater and think, "How can I be a better person?" That's the only way things are going to improve.

I think the first British actor who really worked well in cinema was Albert Finney. He was a back-street Marlon Brando. He brought a great wittiness and power to the screen. The best actor we've had.

In terms of comedy, I never did five-minute sets or clubs or anything. I just started doing shows. Coming from that theater background, it never crossed my mind that I should start doing five-minute sets.

The acting bug first bit when I went to see 'Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead' at the Old Vic.

I grew fond of acting rather late. And that was because I was not getting any job. I had a few friends in Delhi who were associated with theater. They took me to see some plays in Delhi and Baroda. That led me to believe the I could also act. And it was after that I joined National School of Drama in 1993.