Actor Acting Quotes

#1. As an actor, acting is like playing a sport. You do this thing that's intangible, and while it's happening, it's great. But then when it's done, there's really no tangible product. Someone else is capturing it and turning it into something tangible.

Chris Evans

#2. I don't know how to play myself. I'm not interested enough in myself. That's just not how I was educated. That's not how I learned to become an actor. Acting is creating a character.

Corey Stoll

#3. I guess I was a child actor. Acting was one of the things I did alongside going to school: I'd be playing guitar, I'd be playing soccer, and I would be acting in movies.

Michiel Huisman

#4. Writing has made me a better actor. Acting has made me a better writer. So why wouldn't directing make me a better actor and writer?

Jonah Hill

#5. For so many years, I've been an actor acting in other people's movies, and in 'Unstoppable,' I'm producing it, and I have an opportunity to create some of that excitement with style and form and different color templates and things like that. So, as an artist, it's really exciting.

Kirk Cameron

#6. Remember that you are but an actor, acting whatever part the Master has ordained. It may be short or it may be long. If he wishes you to represent a poor man, do so heartily; if a cripple, or a magistrate, or a private man, in each case act your part with honor.

Epictetus

#7. I'm lucky enough to say my day job is acting. I cut my teeth as a theater actor and playwright in New York.

Christopher Denham

#8. My advice has always been to study the craft of acting if you want to be an actor. There are many great schools that teach acting. NYU being one of them.

Peter Facinelli

#9. When I was a little kid, my parents would show me Marx Brothers' films and westerns and stuff like that. That's where all my desire to be an actor comes from and probably most of my understanding of acting comes from for sure.

Alden Ehrenreich

#10. I want to be a great actor someday, and I've decided there's no use philosophizing; the only way is to work at my craft.

Al Pacino

#11. There is a perfect rout of characters in every man - and every man is like an actor's trunk, full of strange creatures, new & old. But an actor and his trunk are two different things

Wallace Stevens

#12. Everybody who is an actor has been acting since they were three.

Mia Wasikowska

#13. I feel as though, as an actor, you can only make brave choices when you're acting with people that you're so relaxed with that you can make a mistake.

Jaime Murray

#14. I studied movies for many years, but I am professionally an actor because I, my background is actually a stage actor and acting.

Tommy Wiseau

#15. I learned so much by being an actor, and part of my sort-of development as a writer is big thanks to the scripts I read in my acting life.

Joel Edgerton

#16. Movie acting is about covering the machinery. Stage acting is about exposing the machinery. In cinema, you should think the actor is playing himself, if he's that good. It looks very easy. It should. But it's not, I assure you.

Michael Caine

#17. Now that was one thing, but from an actor's point of view, this poor young man, crying from the moment I opened the door to the moment he left. Now if an actor did that they would say he's over-acting.

Rod Steiger

#18. I started as an actor, then became a theater director. I loved acting but didn't feel as confident as I needed to be, so I started directing theater; then I played in some movies, and then I felt the need to do my own stuff.

Baltasar Kormakur

#19. I was always a closet lover of acting. My mom was very practical. She never, ever restricted our dreams, always told us we could do or be anything. Then I said, 'Maybe I want to be an actor'. And she said, 'Maybe not that'.

Octavia Spencer

#20. Character actor' is a technical term denoting a clever stage performer who cannot act, and therefore makes an elaborate study of the disguises and stage tricks by which acting can be grotesquely simulated.

George Bernard Shaw

#21. There are ways of avoiding becoming tabloid fodder and therefore giving people license to pry into your private life. And there's a distinction between being an actor and being a celebrity. You may become a celebrity through acting, but you don't need to do so.

Damian Lewis

#22. The mug is a tool. My ace in the hole. To have looks is the bonus on top of what motivates me to be an actor. Not to realize they're an asset would be counterproductive to the cause; they serve the common good.

Billy Zane

#23. It's absolutely impossible to have a serious critical discussion about enthusiasms for movie stars. Because a movie star is an animal separate from acting. Sometimes, he or she is a great actor. Sometimes a third-rate one. But the star is something that you fall in love with ...

Peter Biskind

#24. There's a lot of romanticisation of the intuitive actor and method acting and all kinds of notions about getting inside a character and coming out from there.

Edward Norton

#25. You can see all sorts of things in film acting if you know where to look and what to look for. One thing I often notice is that the actor is looking for his mark, the place where he has to stand to be in the right place in the shot.

Michael Caine

#26. Cosmopolis is the movie of my life. I didn't consider myself an actor before, even if I had 10 years of acting behind me. I always felt like a fraud, and inappropriate. I doubt a lot. David Cronenberg gave me confidence in myself. He changed my way of acting and thinking in this industry.

Robert Pattinson

#27. Acting really suited me because I could connect as an actor to emotion.

Mia Wasikowska

#28. The problem with acting is that there's really no control. You're at the behest of others. Everyone else decides if you did a good job and you have to wait for other people's permission to work as an actor.

Leigh Whannell

#29. An actor has to burn inside with an outer ease.

Michael Chekhov

#30. I don't have any theories about acting, and I don't think about how to do it, except that an actor shouldn't take himself too seriously, and shouldn't try to make acting something it isn't.

James Garner

#31. Having been an actor and a writer for so long - 20 years or so - I felt that it would be daft to go to one's grave without having directed. It's a natural extension of writing and acting, and so I knew it would happen one day.

Stephen Fry

#32. My family took a vacation to Universal Studios when I was really young. Me and my brother Richard - who's also an actor - were both really intrigued by seeing the behind-the-scenes stuff of how films are made. We kind of begged our parents to get into acting.

Jonathan Jackson

#33. My background is really being a writer's actor - that seems to be the way I work best, bringing out the best of writing. There's a whole range of acting skills, and some people can be astonishing with very poor material. That's not me; my skill is essentially unlocking the writing.

Lindsay Duncan

#34. I went to acting school, but only for nine months. If you're an actor, you know, don't really need to learn how to do it.

Patrick Macnee

#35. (Acting) certainly comes-100 percent-from the need to be loved. Any actor who says this isn't true is lying.

Leonardo DiCaprio

#36. My default position is not to be an actor. My default position is to be a follower of Jesus Christ. If that means I continue in acting, great! I'd love that. But if it means I need to change professions someday because I can't provide for my family, well, that's what I need to do.

Kirk Cameron

#37. Acting deals with very delicate emotions. It is not putting up a mask. Each time an actor acts he does not hide; he exposes himself.

Jeanne Moreau

#38. It's the persona that makes you a leading actor. A leading actor has something extra that's fun to watch. But it isn't usually about acting.

Val Kilmer

#39. Acting for me is like a ping-pong game. That's the secret of acting. When you have a really good actor, I always want to be as good as he is or she is.

Sibel Kekilli

#40. It wasn't anything that I thought I was going to be - a singer or an actor or anything like that. I really started acting just because I loved it, and it was more from a need to act and express myself.

Meital Dohan

#41. I always hated the world "acting" - to say, "I'm an actor." It should be more like a believer.

Michael Jackson

#42. They [traditional studios] probably don't understand is that it's a genuine advancement in the actor's tradition. And you know, the tradition and craft of acting. And it's the latest step. You know, we, we tend to find forms of delivering stories that fit our times.

Andy Serkis

#43. I had no idea what it took to be an actor. Then all of a sudden I found myself cast in a TV drama. The director was very harsh with me. One time, he told me this would be my first and last acting job. I seriously thought that acting was not the right career for me.

Lee Byung-hun

#44. Acting is reacting ... there's a magic when you're working with another actor. With voice acting, you're doing it alone, all in your head. So, you have to re-create that essence by yourself. It's not necessarily more difficult. It's just a different set of skills.

Josh Keaton

#45. I'm trying to get an acting gig on 'CSI' or something like that, so we'll see how that works out. I'm a singer, definitely not an actor, so I just follow directions.

Jason Aldean

#46. Acting is a craft, and you need to study to be an actor.

Jason Ritter

#47. I actually grew up hearing this a lot: 'If you're an actor, you can only be an actor, and you have to just do that.' But in order to be a good actor, you have to draw on life experiences. To only concentrate on acting, you're cutting yourself off.

Todd Louiso

#48. One day, when I was 33, I shifted. I suddenly saw acting as a higher calling. I understood that my goal was to serve the play. And I realized if an actor can make audiences' hearts resonate or make them question their values - that's an important thing to do!

Laila Robins

#49. The essence of acting is the conveyance of truth through the medium of the actor's mind and person. The science of acting deals with the perfecting of that medium.

Minnie Maddern Fiske

#50. I am an actor, living generally on air, but I have always elastic hopes for the future; they may be stretched indefinitely, such hopes, without bursting

Vladimir Nabokov

#51. I had the privilege of being able to choose, or at least have the opportunity to work at, being anything but an actor.

Benedict Cumberbatch

#52. I think with acting, since I became an actor ... I, as a person, have become more confident and I have really come out of my shell somewhat ... and back to myself, you know.

Charlie Bewley

#53. I really need to work. People think that I'm no longer interested in acting and only interested in working with the animals. Obviously I have given that impression, but it is not how I feel. I think I'm a good actor. I think I look OK. I don't understand why I'm not working all the time.

Tippi Hedren

#54. I had just arrived in New York from California. I was nineteen years old and excited beyond belief. I was an art student and an acting student and behaved as most young actors did - meaning that there was no such thing as a good actor, 'cause you yourself hadn't shown up yet.

Robert Redford

#55. You've got to be creative in acting business. But I need people to believe in me first. I've got to make my name as an actor.

Darren Shahlavi

#56. Second only to a viable approach to acting, the most important thing an actor can find is a creative family. To have a solid core group of people that you take that journey with together is invaluable.

Jim Parrack

#57. I'm obsessed with those old romance films. I also would love to venture into the silent film world. I think that's extremely compelling and interesting and really relies on the acting, even more so than when you have an actor speaking.

Sami Gayle

#58. I'm not an acting monk or anything. I'm not, like, the most well-adjusted actor.

Adam Driver

#59. I didn't grow up wanting to be an actor, and I didn't go to acting school.

Paul Schneider

#60. One of the things I find about acting is that the less the audience knows about the actor, the more they're able to believe in him in the role.

Hayden Christensen

#61. I like to work as an actor. Not just for money, but because I really enjoy acting.

Peter Sarsgaard

#62. Performance capture is a genre of acting which is not going to go away, it's going to proliferate more and more. I'm passionate about it, and I love it. It's the most liberating tool an actor has, because you are not limited by your own physicality, look, or color of your eyes.

Andy Serkis

#63. I'm an actor; I have made my living by acting, and I almost think I owe it to the public to express my feelings and not as a character on a screen but as myself.

Kirk Douglas

#64. Being an actor in Hollywood involves lots of things beyond acting. Charm really helps.

Pierce Brosnan

#65. We all are actors. The moment we step out of our comfort zones, the moment we are interacting with another, the actor in us comes alive.

Ama H. Vanniarachchy

#66. What motivates every other decision artistically or technically is the acting. This is what motivates everything. Never can a camera move be incompatible with the emotion of the actor at that moment. The movement, the style, the atmosphere, everything is dictated by the actor.

Xavier Dolan

#67. Every scene you will ever act begins in the middle, and it is up to you, the actor, to provide what comes before.

Michael Shurtleff

#68. When I first moved out to Los Angeles I was thinking, you know, I wanted to be an actor but I didn't really know what acting was about. I thought if I could be a model, or even do commercials and stuff like that for the rest of my life, I'd be happy.

Michael Biehn

#69. An actor is a sculptor who carves in snow.

Lawrence Barrett

#70. The Irish Catholic side was married to the life of an actor and I found out acting could be a form of prayer.

Liam Neeson

#71. That's what's so satisfying about acting. You can come as prepared as you like, but there's no accounting for what's going to come at you from the other actor. That's part of the joy and the play of it. If you don't have that it's a different kind of performance.

David Oyelowo

#72. I was on the verge of quitting ... The Acting Center actually saved me as an actor.

Cady McClain

#73. In me all affections take place on the surface, but sincerely. I've always been an actor, and in earnest. Whenever I've loved, I've pretended to love, pretending it even to myself.

Fernando Pessoa

#74. The concealment of art by the actor is as great a mark of genius as it is in the painter.

Francois Delsarte

#75. As a person I'm perfectly vain, I'm just vainer as an actor about my ability. My acting vanity trumps my human vanity.

Rufus Sewell

#76. After I graduated high school and came out to do 'Buffy,' I was enrolled at my mom's university, and I was going to go get a real job. I never thought of acting and never really wanted to be an actor.

Eliza Dushku

#77. If you want to be an actor and you love acting, you can do it whether you're doing something else or not. You can be connected with community theater or make your own little movies. But if you want to be a movie star, you've got a tough road ahead of you.

Alan Arkin

#78. I don't cry. Well, you know, I think coming from an acting background that's really helped me because I more than anyone know that an actor creates a character.

Joanna Kerns

#79. Fame is part of me and my life as an actor. I enjoy the creative aspects of my life as an actor. I enjoy directing and acting as well. But the bottom line for me is not prestige and power. It's about having an exciting, creative life.

Matt Dillon

#80. Why is an actor's unintentional giggling called a 'corpse'? It seems to me quite the opposite. It proves that he's very much alive, and can still tell how silly this all is: him dressed up as someone else speaking words written by a third party.

Antony Sher

#81. I became an actor because it was the only thing I could do. I didn't have any friends, I didn't fit in. But when I started acting everything in my life shifted and I felt happy.

Gillian Anderson

#82. Craft comes into acting later rather than sooner. I was somebody who had to learn through a process - a natural actor doesn't need to.

Sean Penn

#83. In his madness he became a terrifying actor!

Luigi Pirandello

#84. I'm not that good of an actor to fake something like that.

Dana Burkey

#85. I didn't become an actor to be famous. I genuinely love acting and never expected to make a penny at it.

Justin Chon

#86. Whether he's doing great acting or not, you're seeing somebody who is in the tradition of a great actor. What he does with it, that's something else, but he's got it all. The talent, the instrument is there, that's why he has endured.

Al Pacino

#87. I'm a geeky actor, in the way that I like the craft of acting.

Alan Tudyk

#88. Anjelica Huston and Kelly MacDonald are both really special. Anjelica has such a fresh point of view about acting and doesn't seem jaded at all. She seems more like a student and yet she is veteran actor who really brings it.

Sam Rockwell

#89. Acting with creatures that aren't there is kind like acting with an actor who refuses to come out of his trailer. You still have to go on and do the scene.

Liam Neeson

#90. When I started acting, my whole focus and intention was to work as a stage actor in a company where you're asked to different roles - do a comedy, do a tragedy, etc. I haven't had any reservations about jumping from one type of genre to another.

Kyle MacLachlan

#91. I have an immense amount of respect for acting. I've always loved movies and was always fascinated by movie-making. But to become an actor, I wanted to commit myself.

Dwayne Johnson

#92. I wasn't even going to do acting. I don't know how it even happened, to be honest. I was going to go into psychology or something like that. Or business. And then some moment of madness took over and I decided, 'Oh, I'm gonna go to London and try to be an actor.'

Amrita Acharia

#93. Bruce Lee only played himself. Chuck Norris is a martial artist that does acting. I want to be an actor that does martial arts.

Leo Howard

#94. I watched a film with a very famous, great, great actor, I won't mention his name because everyone loves his memory, but I thought, "God he was acting a lot." Great actor, but nonstop acting. Wall to wall, fitted-carpet acting.

Anthony Hopkins

#95. Most American actors are taught the Stanislavsky method ... Method acting, but I really think that as an actor you have to develop what works for you. There is really not one way of doing anything. There are many ways of achieving the same goal.

Ving Rhames

#96. When I was 18 and not sure whether I wanted to be an actor, I realised that a playwright has no voice without an actor. That's my reason for acting: to get that character as right as possible for my writer. And I have never changed my philosophy.

David Suchet

#97. I think I'm an actor because I have very strong imagination and empathy. I never studied acting, but those two qualities are exactly the qualities that make for an activist.

Susan Sarandon

#98. I never consciously set out to be an actor. I just kind of did whatever acting I could do.

Adelaide Clemens

#99. Please don't refer to me as "channeling Mark Twain." I'm an actor. Not a channeler. That word is an iPhone shortcut. Acting is more eloquent than that.

Hal Holbrook

#100. When I first began acting, I assumed an intellectual responsibility attached to my profession, which I had accepted for a long time. My father taught me that an actor had to have a social and political conscience, and that the work that he does has to reflect from that.

Christopher Reeve