They prospect of seeing oneself in the mirror clean-shaven is too close to a Vincent Price film... a prospect not to be contemplated, no matter the compensation.
In film roles, I play a lot of heavies and a lot of bad guys, so I tend to be the jokester and the good-time Charlie on the set.
I started making little short films with friends, and then I decided I wanted to get into the school play in high school.
As a director, or just a film fan who wants to enjoy the festival, Cannes is the worst place to be. But it must be a paradise for distributors and importers.
It took me years to live down Dracula and convince the film producers that I would play almost any other type of role.
Jerry Bruckheimer says that he makes films that he would want to see, and it seems that that coincides with what a lot of people want to see.
I always liked show biz and got to make a few training films at Boeing.
The real trouble with film school is that the people teaching are so far out of the industry that they don't give the students an idea of what's happening.
There's no point in making films unless you intend to show us something special, otherwise just go out and watch a play.
The only thing more intimidating than a huge international film star is your mother-in-law.
Authors of books are not given very much control over the films that are made from their books.
I want to be able to follow the example of those extraordinary British actresses who move effortlessly from film to TV to theatre roles.
I think sometimes when you're working consistently in film, and maybe this is just me, but you do feel quite dislocated from your audience.
What happens a lot in film, though not so much in the theatre, is that you get stroked and sort of massaged, like a little guinea pig.
When anyone plays a mother on film, there is a whole raft of judgment in that a mother is a particular archetype or that every mother is the same. That's complete rubbish.
It would be like the films I've seen where wardens would decide to be in a jail cell for a week, to get a sense of what it would be like to be a prisoner.
Making a film is like putting out a fire with sieve. There are so many elements, and it gets so complicated.
I think because I've maintained my residence in New York, those kinds of films have been more accessible.
I like celluloid, I like film, I like the way that when a movie is projected it sort of breathes a little in the gate. That's the magic of it to me.
Ever since I was a kid, I wanted to make films. That's really all I ever wanted to do.
In the theater, you go from point A to point Z, building your performance as the evening progresses. You have to relinquish that control on a film.
