As early as when I was five or six I wanted to perform.

I don't want to be famous as a movie star and have the whole world love me, I want to be a creative actress.

I collect clothes - they keep building and building. I buy them instead of having them washed.

The bravest thing I ever did was continuing my life when I wanted to die.

As early as when I was five or six I wanted to perform.

Because I'm not perfect looking, I get to play better roles.

I think I can be beautiful with all the little stuff done, and I can be ugly. A lot of attractive actresses can't be ugly.

All that schooling never prepares you for the reality of life.

I don't make an effort to be sloppy. I just don't consider a perfect hairdo and a perfect face to be beautiful. If I had my way I'd dress myself and do my own makeup for magazine shoots.

I knew I could live no other way, that the one thing I wanted was to act and do it well.

Being beautiful can be a curse, especially if you want to be an artist and create.

Fame can be just so annoying because people are so critical of you. You can't just say, 'hi'. You say hi and people whisper' man did you see the way she said hi? What an attitude.

The thing is, I want to play real characters and not all girls can be pretty. The thing is, you get these girls who say 'I'm a character actor' then you see them in a role and nothing has really changed but the outfit.

Success is a nice by-product but what I really want is work.

The worst thing you can do to a kid is tell them that their dreams are invalid.

Like everybody I have many different sides.

I kind of imagine myself at eighty, a cat lady.

Fame can be just so annoying because people are so critical of you. You cant just say hi. You say hi and people whisper man did you see the way she said hi What an attitude.

Sadness is always the legacy of the past; regrets are pains of the memory.

Since others have to tolerate my weaknesses, it is only fair that I should tolerate theirs.

'Yes' is a far more potent word than 'no' in American politics. By adopting the positions which animate the political agenda for the other side, one can disarm them and leave them sputtering with nothing to say.

There's going to be a flood of opportunities right now but I don't think I could really talk about them.

My peers say I have made a difference. That means more to me than winning an Oscar.

I try to be as honest as I possibly can about the contradictions within my own heart and thereby get to something 'true' and revealing and important about contemporary American culture and human nature.

Marriage is a risk; I think it's a great and glorious risk, as long as you embark on the adventure in the same spirit.

She wore her scars as her best attire. A stunning dress made of hellfire.

If people think that you're throwing babies out, dissecting children, to do stem-cell research, I'm not for that.

You can't have rock and roll without drugs, you can't have rock and roll without sex.

If you judge everything by how photographically real it looks, then you're missing out on a lot of what art is about and what communication is. There are ambiguities in life, and that should be reflected in art, cinema, and storytelling, I think.

I like the way hip-hop is now. It's grown up enough so that it can get involved with politics if it feels like it.

Is it true that the American people are war-weary? Absolutely. We are tired of sending our sons and daughters to distant lands year after year after year, to give their lives trying to transform foreign nations.

The ecosystem of our world is a closed system: it would run out of gas, collapse of its own weight.

In the streets, they're very nice. On Twitter, there are people who love to hate me. Sometimes people get mean. I tend to answer like, 'Careful now, know who you're dealing with...' They're like, 'I'm sorry! Don't send the Lord of Light after me!' It's fun to play with that.

Shared joys make a friend, not shared sufferings.

My definition of a producer is 'the man with the dream.'

The friend who can be silent with us in a moment of despair or confusion, who can stay with us in an hour of grief and bereavement, who can tolerate not knowing... not healing, not curing... that is a friend who cares.

Who can worry about a career? Have a life.

If you really want a radio station to play your song, go to that radio station every day with that song in your hand and say, 'Please play it.'

An object in motion tends to remain in motion along a straight line unless acted upon by an outside force.

And what he greatly thought, he nobly dared.

There are books of which the backs and covers are by far the best parts.

When we are unable to find tranquility within ourselves, it is useless to seek it elsewhere.