I think that's what I really liked about Narc: My character has a real operatic range in a way that older movies used to have.

I made three movies in 1995 and I was unhappy with all of them: Sleepers, Incognito, and Speed 2.

Training Day was such a Hollywood movie; I didn't like it.

Now, being on the cover of Vanity Fair is as important as being in great movies. The lines are very, very blurred.

I don't find movies interesting. I just want to do the movies that made me interested in getting into movies, and they're few and far between.

I never turned down a movie because they wouldn't give me enough money.

I think The Exorcist is the best American horror movie ever made. Friedkin was at the top of his game.

I don't like people who use the press to advance themselves in a way that they haven't earned as an actor, performer or director.

When you look at some of the most respected actors there are and the crap that they're in... it didn't used to be that way.

It's interesting to help someone find their vocabulary. There would not have been a De Niro without a Scorsese.

Pacino's always played the suffering prince. I just find that interesting.

You can take a handful of dollars, a good story, and people with passion and make a movie that will stand up against any $70 million movie.

I was making a lot of independent movies before the independent movement.

I think that's what I really liked about Narc: My character has a real operatic range in a way that older movies used to have.

I would never do something like Speed 2 again. If I'd wanted to make those kind of movies I could have signed up for five of them while it was in the can. It wasn't worth it to me. That was just an innocuous, boring movie.

I try to stay under the radar.

I have a problem with the blatant celebrity exhibitionism that happens in this business and being sold purely as a brand.

I really tried to make movies I wanted to see. I thought that if I was good enough, somebody would always need me.

Mostly I do films that mainstream Hollywood wouldn't touch.

You know how many movies it took Tom Cruise before he was making 5, 6 million dollars? It probably took a billion dollars in box office.

Everybody acts like they're in a movie in most movies. That's why they stink.

It's easy to be a movie star. The shoes are already there. They just put you in the shoes.

When actors talk about research, they're just patting themselves on the back.

I don't have a problem with fame. I got into this business intending to be very successful, but I wanted it to be at my price.

I have all this time between projects, and I'm not so sure that's a healthy thing. It's scary, because at 36 I'm woefully unqualified for anything else.

If I was coming into the business today, I wouldn't be in it. Knowing what I know, absolutely not.

In this watering-place I acted an heroic character, badly studied; and being a novice on such a stage, I forgot my part before a pair of lovely blue eyes.

I do like to embed a fictional character firmly in an occupation.

But even with a character like Cary who is relatively outlandish, at the end of the movie he's in a place where I wouldn't have expected him to be - taking on the responsibility of a woman who is pregnant and who used to be his best friend's wife.

Always, your work is the same: You have to tell a story, you have to make a character. It doesn't matter if there are thousands of dollars, millions behind it, or if there is nothing.

Each of us is meant to have a character all our own, to be what no other can exactly be, and do what no other can exactly do.

I liked Huckleberry Finn and Tom Sawyer, and that is the kind of character that I would like to have played. That would have been more in tune with who I really was.

It's the difficulty we had with Mr. Bean, actually, when it went from TV to film. You certainly discover that you need to explain more about a character.

In a lot of ways, the make-up was the character.

The more we study the Indian's character the more we appreciate the marked distinction between the civilized being and the real savage.

So many people have said that to me, that what they really like about Alex is what she brings out in Marissa, and what this situation brings out in her, a hint of happiness and another side to her character.

I've been on the show for six years and I don't even know what her history is. I sort of make things up in my mind, but I think it's hard for an audience to follow and invest in a character when they don't have the details.

It is not true that drink changes a man's character. It may reveal it more clearly.

Because I killed a guy in real life, and because my character kills a guy onstage, they said I could never do anything this great again. I resented that.

Well, I go to the theater today, and its curtain - there is no curtain in this play; the lights go down and go up - and we start. And I live this character for two hours. There are only two of us in the play. And It's a complete experience.

I just kind of understood it, and I threw my love for others and love for life into the character, and was having a blast. I loved playing Dharma. I loved it!

I think if you play a character that is fearless, then it's boring. I think that's what was so incredible about Harrison Ford, is that he always seemed like he was never going to survive it, he's always scared, and yet he always does survive it somehow.

If you look to lead, invest at least 40% of your time managing yourself - your ethics, character, principles, purpose, motivation, and conduct. Invest at least 30% managing those with authority over you, and 15% managing your peers.

Every character I play has to be the hero of his own story, the way we're all heroes of our own lives.

To be a character who feels a deep emotion, one must go into the memory's vault and mix in a sad memory from one's own life.

Character is power; it makes friends, draws patronage and support and opens the way to wealth, honor and happiness.

You have to understand the tone of the movie, because if it's supposed to be funny, it can be funny violent like the Home Alone stuff, but you have to really understand the tone of what you're doing and make the action work for that and for the character.

In Shakespearean tragedy the main source of the convulsion which produces suffering and death is never good: good contributes to this convulsion only from its tragic implication with its opposite in one and the same character.

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.