Quotes About Preparation

On a day I start, I have a turkey sandwich for lunch. I don't consider it a ritual, but I'm anxious on those days.

I always buy the smaller turkeys. On the pre-baste put pats of butter on the meat under the skin, put the skin back on, put a bunch of seasoning on the top, call it a day, put it in the oven. With a 10 - 12 pound turkey you are done in a couple of hours.

Actors are terrible at overthinking things before they turn up to work, and they decide on a way they're going to do it, and then it's hard to break them out of it.

If I was a soldier going to war, I'd be pretty scared the night before a battle. It's a scary thing. And I want my readers to feel that fear as they turn the page.

You can't show up at the bedside and then turn on your skills. You have to keep your game sharp all the time.

Being on 'Total Divas' definitely prepared me. Because when you're on a reality show, you're used to cameras following you. However, the big difference with 'Big Brother' is they do not turn off.

We ended up realizing that's not an economical way to create creatures, putting people in green leotards and figuring it out later. You can maybe do that if you're making 'Avatar,' but we need to know what the creatures look like before we turn on the camera.

For what we do training, as a fighter, you have to be able to flip that switch where you turn into that savage, that guy that's prepared to go to war.

It's always difficult, when you have such a quick turnaround and a long flight, to try to get ready for a game so quickly.

I'm not going to tell you the movies, but I remember getting halfway through the thing and everything sort of tunnel-visioned on me and I couldn't read the script anymore. I looked at the people and I just turned and ran out in a cold sweat. It took me about a year to study it and feel comfortable going in and reading for people.

When actors have the opportunity to play a larger-than-life icon - my wife did it with Tina Turner, and Jamie Foxx did it with Ray Charles - you have to make a decision how you go in. What do you start with? Where do you begin?

Often we eat squid fried, so it's fun to grill it for a change. To grill squid, slice the cleaned bodies open into two flat pieces and thread them, along with the tentacles, onto skewers, then grill quickly over a direct fire with the coals as close as possible to the grate, turning the squid several times.

I'm basically turning my apartment into an armory.

I kept turning down roles because I knew I just wasn't ready for them.

Foresight turns out to be a critical adaptive strategy for times of great stress.

You don't ease off until your horses are saddled and on the track. Until then, I'm like a snapping turtle. I snap at almost everybody with impatience.

Every guy has got to have a tuxedo. If you're ever invited to an event where a tuxedo is necessary, you need to have it ready to go. A good-fitting one, too. It just has to look good.

I put on the tuxedo, and it's like putting on overalls - they're my work clothes. Then I go to work. I'm relaxed. I do my job.

Who bothers to cook TV dinners? I suck them frozen.

When I attack a role, be it TV, film or stage, the first thing I say is, I don't want to know anything. If it's good I don't want to hear it; if it's bad I don't want to hear it. The only thing either thing can do is distract me. I like to stay focused.

You're a professional. You don't need for me to break a film down for you. If you want to stop the guy you're playing, they pay you millions of dollars. You get you a TV and break the player down yourself.

Memorising my lines is actually something I do fairly well. I look at it a few times and it is pretty much there. When your shooting on TV, they do it in such a way that it is pretty easy.

I did a whole lot of work before taking up my first movie. From TV commercials to Telugu films, I learnt a lot from them all.

I had a brilliant drama teacher while I was at Roland Park: Ann Mainolfi. But the school was mostly rich in academics. It wasn't like I was prepping myself for a life in acting. There, you prepped yourself to have a stable future. The school's piece de resistance is college prep - it didn't teach you how to audition for a TV show.