We make a contract within ourselves as actors or directors or writers about how much of ourselves we let into projects. You can actually figure out before you work on something how much blood you will have to let emotionally.

I got heavily into the drum-and-bass scene, which is really wicked.

The loneliness is when you pick up and move, even if you are not originally from that place, and you have some memories that you want to embrace. Having a life in transit, I feel like you are always looking out the back window.

All India radio was worldwide.

There's got to be something greater than us.

You have to work with what you are given, even in Shakespeare. we have our form and it is important that we free ourselves through it.

America makes up its own mind about what it wants to see.

It is important to keep your head up and follow what you believe is right.

In every character I play, I try to imbibe something. Every film is a learning process for me.

I love films for the fact that it is like working under a microscope. It is sort of like a laboratory.

The camera is interested in what you are thinking as opposed to just what you are doing or saying.

I like the theatre because you paint with broad strokes. To me the theatre is stretching its definition really far.

I applied to American Repertory School up at Harvard at got in.

I had been working early in my life in films - since I was 11.

I think that I have sold out sometimes.

It is important to tell good stories. You can tell stories even if they are not huge, epic, and wonderful. You can still take the responsibility for being a scribe of your tribe.

We make a contract within ourselves as actors or directors or writers about how much of ourselves we let into projects. You can actually figure out before you work on something how much blood you will have to let emotionally.

Acting school was summer camp, and I needed concentration camp. I had so many different ideas swirling between culture and how to tie things together.

I knew I was happy when I was dancing.

My family was very supportive of my acting. They didn't really have a choice because I got jobs acting before anyone could really say anything. It paid my way through college and helped my family out.

Part of the work is determining through what instrument you are playing. Actors are physical, olympian storytellers and we should be able to create entire landscapes with nothing.

I want to present interesting stories that don't qualify themselves just by virtue of their ethnographic type.

The turntable is now an instrument at the Smithsonian.

I think that rap is narrative, when it's done right.

There is extraordinary similarities between the Midwest in America and Europe in that there is this sense of vast, open sky and loneliness and cold.

I hear music as narrative.

Rap is rhythm and poetry. Hip-hop is storytelling and poetry as well.

It is important to make your own stuff. Even if you are not an actor, it is important to not stop involving yourself as a creative person.

When you get to play with the big boys, your game improves drastically.

My first acting job happened by accident when I was really young. I was in fifth grade and my teacher saw an ad in the paper and took me to the audition after school and I got the part.

Rap is rhythm and poetry. Hip hop is storytelling and poetry as well.

It is important to keep you head up and follow what you believe is right.

Actors love mental disorders, dialects, and corsets. Give them one of the three and they're happy.

What's fascinating is that when you write a script, it's almost a stream of consciousness. You have an idea that it means something, but you're not always sure what. Then when you get on the set, the actors teach you.

Young actors often don't think of the consequences of doing nudity or sex scenes. They want the role so badly that they agree to be exploited, and then end up embarrassing family, friends, and even strangers.

I've seen many actors go awry by making the wrong choices early on.

Actors are able to trick themselves into treating anything as if it's fantastic. It's a kind of madness really.

David Cronenberg knows what we actors do as artists.

I like doing them and they're ridiculous and the actors can improvise a lot, and they don't have to be really realistic characters that hit a very specific tone as in a feature film. They're really fun, I want to make more of them definitely.

I'm not in the business of becoming famous. And that's the advice I give to younger aspiring actors. Work onstage and do the little roles. In the end it's not important to be seen. It's important to do. There's a lot of disappointment in this business, but my family keeps me grounded.

Actors get pigeonholed very quickly, particularly movie actors. In the theater, one is more used to casting people against type and trusting that their talent and skill will get them through.

Comedians are not usually actors, but imitations of actors.

I was very pleased you know, and I was afraid that I might stick out, but I didn't. My happiest thing about that picture is that I proved that American actors can speak as well and also fit in with an ensemble like that.

I've worked with a lot of really fine actors, both on stage and on screen. The level of their game lifts me up and brings the level of my game up to theirs. Always. It's like a constant upgrade.

I feel like I'm the most well-adjusted character on the show, even though I'm sure the other actors would tell you the same thing about their characters.

There's a constant flow of child actors. It's kind of funny to watch the new crew come through. I think, You poor little things. You're going to have to struggle for a long time.

I'll miss the relationships I have built with these actors. I'll miss the devotion we have to this work. Over this length of time, the tendency is to think it will never end.

After the war, there was no industry. We lost the war. We had our whole city destroyed. No money. No studio. No film. No camera. No equipment. We would shoot in the street. We had no actors. Nothing. But we wanted to do movies. And we did the best movies in the world.

An actors' tribute to me is in his work.