Quotes About Acting

I guess I'm lucky that I've been able to play a wide range of parts and a wide range of types of productions - I haven't felt much typecasting.

I have been fortunate to experience a wide range of characters. What more can an actor ask for?

I like to play a wide range of characters. The more they're unlike me, the better I like it.

Every actress hopes to play a wide range of characters because not often you don't.

I look at characters to see if they have some contrasts to play with; I think that's always what I'm looking for in characters: ones that have a wide range of expression.

When I played Robert Howard in 'The Whole Wide World', I was struggling with it. There's this dual thing where you feel real good about being able to play this juicy part, and then there's constant shame: 'Who am I to pretend to know who this guy was? Who am I to represent this guy for people who never knew him?'

I'll admit, sometimes I've paid the bills with acting. You know the phrase, 'It's one for the money, two for the showreel.' I don't want that as a director. I don't want to compromise myself. There's a big old wide world out there. I want to explore it.

I think 'method acting' is a widely abused term.

It's nice to go and be a guest on a television sitcom. It pays well; it's easy because generally it's a supporting role, so you go, you do two or three things, you're in touch with people there. They're widely popular, so they're seen by many people.

I was in Hyderabad shooting for a Telugu film with Mahesh Babu when Aamir called, saying he wanted me to play the widow Jwala in 'Mangal Pandey.'

'The Count' wasn't a real stretch. I was doing pretty generic Bela Lugosi bad vampire on purpose. It was supposed to be lame. I didn't put fangs on; it was a guy who was just going through the motions. I drew on the widow's peak with eyebrow pencil and wore a turtleneck, not a tux.

I started out in the 1970s doing the Wife, the Bimbo, and the Ditz, and if I somehow get a serious role, they all wanna know the same thing: When are you going back to comedy?

People who come to 'The Country House' are like, 'You're on 'The Good Wife' now.' But I've been on since the second season! I feel that the interest in the children in that series is almost tangential.

My wife Ciera and I can stand face-to-face in our kitchen and stare into each other's eyes and talk for three hours without noticing that any time has passed. She is the kind of gal I spent a lifetime daydreaming about. She is an actor and a creative companion.

Psychologically it gets challenging at times to switch into a female character. But the moment I get into the look of Palak, I automatically get into the mood of her. My wife and parents have no problem with it. My wife has only told me not to enter the house in the Palak get-up after the shoot.

That was fun to play. There were some nice special effects coupled with some really nice moments with child and wife. I also was able to age to about 100 years in 'Brief Candle.'

The biggest problem I have doing my acting is having to interact with other people. I think if it wasn't for my wife and my kids, I'd probably be a hermit.

It's always a mystery when you're going into a role - 'Here's your wife of 40 years and... action!' How do you create ease or chemistry or whatever is supposed to exist?

There are so many huge roles in the theatre: if you've got the option to play Hedda Gabler on stage, why wouldn't you choose that over a three-line part in a Hollywood film as somebody's maid or somebody's wife or somebody's best friend?

My wife says that stage acting is like being on a tightrope with no net, and being in the movies, there is a net - because you stop and go over it again. It's very technical and mechanical. On stage you're on your own.

It's great to play somebody's wife, but not all the time. There's so many other stories to tell.

And doing a film in that period, and having to really celebrate what they wore back then, how they sat and how they spoke. You know, what the etiquette was back then for a lady. All of those things are like putting on a wig and transforming yourself, which I love.

You can't play a high school student forever, so at some point, I'm going to have to tear down that wall and tear off that wig and be me.

I've been acting since I was six. I actually played a boy when I was six in 'Tommy.' I played Tommy and they put a wig on me. They put up my hair and put this little boy wig on me and that was my first acting experience. Then I did some other professional theater. I did Shakespeare when I was older.