My mother was an actress in comedies. My father wrote scenarios. They were not opposed to my being an actor. I really didn't know what it meant, but I wanted to be one anyway.
Sometimes the odds are against you-the director doesn't know what the hell he's doing, or something falls apart in the production, or you're working with an actor who's just unbearable.
I'm a con artist in that I'm an actor. I make people believe something is real when they know perfectly well it isn't.
What was accomplished in 'Band of Brothers' was incredible, from the writing and producing to the performances of the actors who honored all those men that fought bravely and gave the ultimate sacrifice for the freedoms we enjoy today.
Actors ought to be larger than life. You come across quite enough ordinary, nondescript people in daily life and I don't see why you should be subjected to them on the stage too.
My old manager of the Irish National Theatre said 'Don't worry about being a star, just worry about being a working actor. Just keep working.' I think that's really good advice.
Working out and working as an actor have gone hand in hand - I always feel more prepared if I know I have done a workout. It gives me confidence - and peace of mind.
I use so much of myself in everything I do. I think every actor does because you have no one else to go to but yourself and your own imagination.
I didn't like Barbie dolls, so I used to have this overactive imagination, and I used to pretend to be all these different things. My weird childhood fetishes seem to have come to life now as an actor.
My first job was a film called 'Storm Damage' for the BBC. I was 16 and working with really respected British actors. I didn't have an agent at the time, and it kind of threw me into real acting.
You learn, even at 'S.N.L.,' that the funniest scripts a lot of the time were written with the actor, because they know what makes people laugh. It's always going to be better if they own it.
I can't say that I haven't done some bad acting in my time. I have. Usually that involves what we actors call 'indicating,' when you twirl your mustache.
On 'Heroes' I got to work with Greg Grunberg all the time and Masi Oka, and they both are just wonderful actors. I don't know - you learn so much by watching people like that, I guess.
I think kids are natural actors. You watch most kids; if they don't have a toy, they'll pick up a stick and make a toy out of it. Kids will daydream all the time.
The actors I would like to work with are Julia Roberts, just because I've admired her work for a long time, well Brad Pitt. I think you know my reasons.
I get asked all the time if I want to do more dramatic acting, and I really doubt that dramatic actors get asked if they want to do more comedies. I don't really know why that is.
I became an actor by accident. I suppose I figured since I was in musical comedy from the time I was a teenager, I suppose I figured that I'd always been in that world to some extent.
And people say it all the time: 'You're a celebrity.' No, I'm an actor. I'm a producer. I'm a director. I'm a toad. I'm roadkill. I'm anything but a celebrity.
I pick out young people and teach them in less time than it would take me to alter the methods of people from the boards, and I get actors who look the parts they have to fill.
The lighting is so important. One thing that makes me nuts about the lighting now is that they spend an enormous amount of time lighting the set, the background. But the most important thing in the scene is the actor.
I was brought up in a house full of women; the first time I realised no one was interrupting me was when I was on stage - that's probably the subconscious reason I became an actor.
