I went to college for one semester, and I took every subject I could, and I ended up failing. So I thought to myself, Ever since I was a kid, I've loved expression - and that's when I started thinking about acting.
A wonderful but kind of a terrible truth about acting is that you actually get to a point where you become content with an impossible task: it is really impossible to properly prepare. You kind of have to start over every time.
I guess I don't like the fact that my life is becoming less and less my own - the prevailing attitude that you have an obligation to deliver yourself to the public. Actually, you're delivered to the public whether you like it or not. I guess if you don't like it, you should stop doing what provokes it. In my case, that's acting.
I never dreamed that shooting a film would be so hard. There was less regulation then of child actors' hours. Even the concept of acting confused me.
Directing is a lot of fun, but you have to be on your toes every minute. If you zone out for even a second, you'll miss something and things will get screwed up. And here's a little secret that I'm going to let out of the bag: That is not the case with acting.
I was able to support myself by acting alone about six years ago. Until then, I was just scraping by.
I was going to be in an acting school in London, and then I promptly got thrown out of an acting school in London. Well, it wasn't that I got thrown out as much as I was not invited back, which is the same thing, just more polite.
I will always do stand-up, even if my acting career takes off. Stand-up is my life.
I believe that acting in any medium is the same thing, it's discovering the truth in where you are.
I did my share of kid acting, like lots of us do. I even played King Herod when I was 6, but when I got to the end of my school period, that was it.
I didn't study acting.
Acting wasn't what I wanted to do forever. I wanted a home, and I wanted children.
I try to not think too much about how stuff gets seen as it's being done by a woman. Because if you think about it, then you end up thinking about how you're acting, and if you are thinking about how you're acting, then you are preoccupied and you're going to end up being insincere. You're kind of not present.
I think the beauty of working with young people is they remind you of the spirit of acting and it's just a big play.
To stay interested in acting, I have to keep trying stuff I've never done before.
The art of acting consists in keeping people from coughing.
I don't let it bother me too much if someone doesn't like me. I just figure there's no accounting for taste. It's not me, it's my acting. It's like if someone doesn't like someone's food, they just don't like my acting.
I couldn't do an acting job just to be working. It really had to have some soul to it.
I was aware that I was not getting the good acting roles because I was either too handsome, too pretty or whatever. I was being judged in ways that left me nowhere to go. You have to be patient.
I decided I was going to give up singing and concentrate on acting, and a result of that, I didn't do another film for two to three years, and I don't blame it on anybody but myself.
I suppose that if I could have quit, I would have, because in those days I never wanted to be an actress, the acting was something to do while I waited for a chance to study writing and directing. But I guess I was just meant to be an actress. Because, here I am.
For me acting is a passion and an art, and always will only be that. I don't have any rules when it comes to acting. I'll do anything. But it depends on the script. Either I'll have passion for the project or I won't. It's got to fuel me.
When I went to San Francisco for the first time in 1975, I went there for a summer, this acting training program for three months in the summer - I've never been the same.
There was a show at Sesame Place where you could lay down on mat in front of a blue screen, and the monitor would show you flying with Super Grover. I must have been five years old when I did it, and I still remember it. Likely the origins of my acting bug.
I would advise anyone seriously interested in acting to study, train, and work as much as possible... You will know soon enough if it's the right avenue for you.
There are a lot of other things in this world that can and will bring me joy. Acting is one of them.
Photography is a hobby born out of my time in undergrad at USC. It is more of a pleasurable hobby, a stress reliever. I don't consider it a professional endeavor like acting or directing.
So much of movie acting is in the lighting. And in loving your characters. I try to know them, and with that intimacy comes love. And now, I love Voldemort.
I've given just as much of my life to that, and I practiced it with the same zeal, as I have acting. And I think that many of my skill sets from being a housewife I used for producing. Because you don't stop until it's done.
I think I found that when I was doing a show on a regular basis and just acting constantly, that was when I was at my happiest.
I find any sort of acting that doesn't have any humor in it is mind-numbingly boring. 'Serious acting' is the kind of acting that I don't ever respond to.
Don't stink up the place with bad acting, if an opportunity comes your way.
Singing is a way of releasing an emotion that you sometimes can't portray when you're acting. And music moves your soul, so music is the source of the most intense emotions you can feel. When you hear a song and you're acting it's incredible. But when you're singing a song and you're acting it's even more incredible.
I've watched directors since my very first day of acting because I knew I wanted to direct.
When it comes to the acting stuff, I like to show up for a couple days and kind of be outrageous and silly, and go back to my day job.
Music is extremely intuitive, which acting too in a different way.
