Quotes on Actors

The most honest form of filmmaking is to make a film for yourself.

I was able to capture on film things the actors didn't even know they were doing.

As an actor you become that lighting rod between the person who made the play and the audience.

I've always been a character actor, although I'm not quite sure what that means. All my scripts are absolutely covered in notes, so any time I say anything - even 'pass the salt' - I have six subtexts, comments on what I really mean when I'm saying that. Maybe that's what gives the impression that I'm saying one thing and thinking something else.

Being an actor is a religious calling because you've been given the ability, the gift to inspire humanity. Think about that on the way to your soap opera audition.

If I meet someone at a bus stop, I want to really meet that person. I don't want to be 'Hugh Jackman, the famous actor.'

Good actors I've worked with all started out making faces in a mirror, and you keep making faces all your life.

I have often seen an actor laugh off the stage, but I don't remember ever having seen one weep.

I think it's my job to risk looking foolish. One of the things I've learned from the actors I've worked with is you don't get something for nothing. If you don't risk looking foolish, you'll never do anything special.

One forgets too easily the difference between a man and his image, and that there is none between the sound of his voice on the screen and in real life.

With a book I am the writer and I am also the director and I'm all of the actors and I'm the special effects guy and the lighting technician: I'm all of that. So if it's good or bad, it's all up to me.

It's a shame how a lot of actors use theater as a stepping stone to film and television work; I think it shouldn't be treated that way. Maybe it's narcissism or something. I think we should always go back to it. I try and do a play a year, and I think that's really helped me.

In 'Hamilton,' we're telling the stories of old, dead white men, but we're using actors of color, and that makes the story more immediate and more accessible to a contemporary audience.

I cannot absorb living in a world where I have an Oscar for best actress and Denzel doesn't have one for best actor.

I'm not a pyrotechnical director; I'm not good with all those innovative things. What I am interested in is how actors can touch the heads and hearts of an audience.

People assume actors are born liars, but I'd argue the actor's job is to tell the truth. And I've realised I'm not a good liar.

An actor is a sculptor who carves in snow.

God knows I've had productions where there were actors in my plays who were making more money per week than I was.

An actress can only play a woman. I'm an actor, I can play anything.

I'm never certain of a performance - my own or the other actors' - or the script or anything... But to me it seems there's only one place in the world the camera can be, and the decision usually comes immediately.

I'm no longer dependent on the movie business to make a living. So if I want to make movies as other old guys would play golf, I can.