Quotes About Theater

When I was a teenager, I continued to visit imaginary places by spending all my free time at our local community theater. Whether I acted in a play or worked backstage, the world of Tennessee Williams or Shakespeare always seemed more real to me than the dreary life of high school.

'A Streetcar Named Desire' is the play I've probably read the most times in my life, and I love the weirdness of all the scene outs but especially the end of the second scene, when Williams brings a tamale vendor on stage to simply say, 'Red hot!'

Before acting, I was always attracted to words, to literature - be they the words of Williams, Arthur Miller, Shakespeare or Moliere.

I want to do a Tennessee Williams play.

I was an understudy in a show called 'One Over The Eight' with Kenneth Williams and Sheila Hancock.

Tennessee Williams moves my soul.

When I was on stage in the '50s, it was a glory time, a golden time with Tennessee Williams and Arthur Miller. There was real talent. And now, the theater is a little Disney-fied.

We studied so much Shakespeare in drama school and I'd like to go back to that. I'd really throw myself into something that would probably petrify me. Tennessee Williams. Something juicy.

Movies, I don't really get the bad guys. In theater, I get more bad guys. Both audiences and directors are more willing... to allow people to stretch. In movies, you do one thing, and then that's their reference.

I studied acting in NYU's graduate program, in which we covered everything from Ibsen and Chekov to August Wilson and David Mamet.

I grew up when one of America's greatest black playwrights, August Wilson, was writing about life in Pittsburgh, but I never saw myself in any of his straight-male plays. And then I see 'Angels,' which was so honest and painful, and it had this black drag queen in it, Belize, with a big heart. I finally had a character to relate to.

The first theater subscription I ever bought was the August Wilson season at Signature. I remember thinking a whole season to one playwright was a great way for a master to do a victory lap.

Acting is like a sporting match; a tennis game, but no one should win or lose. The game's the thing!

I sang in 'Waiting for Guffman,' and I sang in 'A Mighty Wind.' I can carry a tune, but I don't like that Broadway singing.

Inherit the Wind is a wonderful play, and I was in the original with Paul Muni.

When you're in theater, you inevitably wind up working in restaurants. I made pastry.

I saw my sister in this production of 'Whistle Down the Wind' - my sister was a really big theater kid - and when I saw her do that, I was so obsessed. Those were like my first words; I was singing along to the songs. From that point on, I did theater, and then I got into acting in film and television.

I started out doing musical theater specifically - I thought I would eventually move to New York and audition for stuff, and maybe wind up on Broadway or something. Well, that didn't happen.

Before there were stages we worked on raised platforms with cheesecloth overhead to diffuse the bright sunlight. The reason they built stages for silents was to get out of the wind.

I felt like jumping out a window when I heard Streisand was doing it. I'd played it four and a half years - I thought Dolly was mine. But after the initial shock wore off, I realized no great part is ever exclusively anybody's.

There was a small window when I wanted to be an astronaut. It may have coincided with not getting cast in a high school play.

Kids used to come round to my house, and I'd force them to do a play in the bay windows of my house and get all the mums and dads to sit and watch. I'd write the programme, write the play and be the star.

Neither of my parents are involved in theater or acting, but they are very artistic. My mom is a painter; she's an artist. She went to school for fashion illustration. My father is into collecting antiques and fine wine, so they're both really creative people.

I was a hostess, I sold shoes, but I don't function well in jobs that don't have to do with what I love. I have cleaned bathrooms in theaters, I have sold wine in theaters, I have sold tickets, because I will do anything, anything, to stay in this world.