It was difficult every ten days having a new director. I'm a real collaborator and, as an actor, I want to be directed. It's hard for me to shift gears.

I'd really been wanting to do a television series. I was looking for a comedy.

I've been playing tennis, and just whatever sport is in front of me I will do.

The three of us acting was truly one of the best experiences I've ever had. I really look forward to the days when all three of us shoot together, because the sparks really fly.

I've had the same friends for ten, fifteen years.

But on the other hand, I talked to a woman who was a working woman, and it was actually great for her, because she had her husband one week of the month and the other three weeks, while he was with his other wives, she got to pursue what she wanted to do.

The government doesn't really prosecute for polygamy anymore, but a lot of the arrests are of groups supporting themselves through welfare scams or for child abuse. So that was all I'd really heard about polygamists.

But I don't think that it's a form of family that I would be comfortable in. I've found a way to this character and this family, but I still believe that a marriage is between two people and not seven or three.

Finally, after a lot of searching and digging, it was simply the love of family that gave me a road into the character. Once I got into that, and we delved into what it would be like to survive cancer and the ability to see how precious life is, it became easier to play her.

It was really important in my relationship with James Caan that I understood the relationship between the family and the father.

It was difficult every ten days having a new director. I'm a real collaborator and, as an actor, I want to be directed. It's hard for me to shift gears.

You hear about these shows where there are all these women are supposedly always in a catfight, and then you find out in reality that they're all getting along fine.

But we're all so different, we're different ages; we're not vying for the same roles. There's no competition, there's really kind of a sisterhood, on and off the set, you know?

I've been working on Barb for a while. I looked at her as a sort of every woman. She's incredibly strong; she's incredibly generous. She's seemingly insane because she is in the situation of a polygamous relationship, but she had definite reasons to do it.

Well, I think a lot of people only hear about the extreme, fundamentalist kind of polygamists, because they're always in the news being brought up on charges.

The press seems to love pitting women against each other.

My favorite actor is Wallace Beery.

I've been a very lucky actor.

I don't think I could be happy as an actor if there was a tyrant on the set.

When I was starting to get noticed as an actor in the 1970s for something other than the third cowboy on the right who ended up dying in every movie or episode, Burt Reynolds was the biggest star in the world.

Most parts that can be played by one actor can equally well be played by another, but not this.

I think, frankly, that I'm a better director than I was an actor.

I knew an actor's career goes up and down and back up again. Your standing in this business can't be your whole identity; otherwise, you're doomed.

I don't think any actor feels comfortable watching themselves in movies. You must be very narcissistic. The problem with your own opinion of yourself is that contrary to the normal spectators, when you watch a film you are in, you only watch yourself.

I don't think there has been any increase in sophistication in the audience. When people are aware of a concept that's easy to understand, and there's an actor who will attract them to the theater and it's a movie that's funny three-quarters of the time, it will be successful.

I never dreamed about being an actor, because that was out of reach. Coming from a small town that was big in farming, and also big in clothing factories, you don't dream about being a professional football player or an actor.

My goal was always to be recognized as a good actor but no one was interested in that, simply because society just wants to warm towards your appearance. This is the great blemish of society.

If you really do want to be an actor who can satisfy himself and his audience, you need to be vulnerable.

To be honest with you, when I got into this I never thought about reviews. I never thought about what people would say about me. I was just a young guy who was excited to become a comedian and an actor and I just wanted to get to do what I got to do.

It was very natural for me to want to disappear into dark theater, I am really very shy. That is something that people never seem to fully grasp because, when you are an actor, you are meant to be an exhibitionist.

I think that I've still not been successful at playing the role of the retired actor, and I'd like to work on that.

And once you cease to be a real person, you stop being a good actor.

When I decided I wanted to be an actor, I said I wanted to work with quality actors and directors.

There are roles I want that my agency might not want me to do because of the subject matter or whatever. Or there are roles that people won't bring to me because they don't think I'll do it. And that is a big strain because an actor wants to act.

Reality is, I'm an actor and an entertainer, and I really wouldn't know what to do with another profession.

I still feel like I'm trying to make it. It's hard to shed the struggling actor thing.

Only a great actor finds the difficulties of the actor's art infinite.

Follow the wisdom of the great actor, James Cagney, you hit your mark, you look the other guy in the eye, and you tell the truth.

I was always a character actor. I just looked like Little Red Riding Hood.

In other words, I wouldn't like to be an actor if I could only be real. I like to get wild, behaviorally wild, and it's crazy to think of any form where it's just one way.

An actor entering through the door, you've got nothing. But if he enters through the window, you've got a situation.

Oh, well, in Los Angeles everybody is an actor, or a producer, or a writer, or a director, or an agent, or... So everybody understands the hours.

I didn't want to be an actor.

I'm always looking, as an actor, for activities. I think it's far more interesting to watch what people do than what they say. You always want to watch behavior, because the dialogue as written by our illustrious leaders is great. Eminently playable.

That's always something that's really important for an actor - to find an opportunity to do a scene where there is a moment like that, where you manage to connect with everyone.

In the editing room, 20 percent of the time you're using stuff from before the actor knew the camera was rolling or you're taking a line from somewhere else and putting it in his mouth.

And, you know, when you are a kid, everybody wants to be an actor. I think that everybody wants to be in show business, frankly.

An actor is at most a poet and at least an entertainer.

To wait, for an actor, is not like someone who's waiting to see the doctor. It's not the kind of wait where you get bored.