I was an assistant director for a year, and I realized, 'God, this is a lot of hard work. This is going to take time. So what's the shortcut? What's the better option?' Then thankfully, someone said, 'Why don't you become an actor?'
I've always slightly envied other actors I know who have different reputations. I think, 'God, you don't get people coming up to you, going, 'Hey!' - because they're scared of you.'
But some actors I have met possess an intelligence that I can only dream of. It's about character, it's about behavior. They understand things about people that I simply don't see.
I never said that I wanted to be an actor when I was a kid. I didn't know. I thought I was going to be a singer and musician. That's what I had been doing, for a huge part of my life.
As an actor, I think it's always important to separate yourself from your characters because, when you include yourself in a character, you're taking a liberty that you don't really have unless you're life is that incredibly close to the character.
When I was in theater I was forever trying to inhabit a space which puts yourself under the microscope as an actor and your personality and your take on life, but actually through another portal of a character.
I'm still an athlete, I'm still a stockbroker, I'm still an actor. I think of it as more of an opening of new doors than an actual transition. I enjoy all of those things, which is why they remain a part of my life.
I think you choose how you walk through this life. I think if you choose to participate in a paradigm that is looks-based, if you're an actor, then it can be empowering in some ways, and it can be really limiting in some ways in terms of time and lon...
I think having worked in a department store setting, if my life had not taken a drastically different turn when I became an actor, there's a very high probability I would have continued to work at the department store.
I do think I'm lucky I met Michael. Not just Michael Douglas the actor and producer with two Oscars on the shelf, but Michael Douglas, the love of my life. I really do think it was meant to happen.
There are ways of avoiding becoming tabloid fodder and therefore giving people license to pry into your private life. And there's a distinction between being an actor and being a celebrity. You may become a celebrity through acting, but you don't nee...
As you get older and ease your way into being a character actor you have to be comfortable with where you are in life and career, and I'm very comfortable with what I'm doing - working on projects I'm proud of.
I was a salsa dancer for the majority of my life, from, like, 7 to 17, and did the World Salsa Congresses. I realized that I wanted to continue obviously to be a performer. But in my household, being an actor and jumping into acting is not really acc...
There are not many things in my life I can be absolutely proud of or certain I got right, but one of them is that I've got better as an actor. I've learnt how to do it. And I still have enough energy to do it.
I've been a sports fan all my life, and like most other actors, I'm convinced I could have been a pro athlete if Hollywood hadn't come calling.
I loved the domesticity of my life as a struggling actor. When I wasn't going to auditions, I could do things like cook dishes from scratch and take them to parties or be really thoughtful about birthdays and anniversaries.
I wanted to be an actor because I wanted to be onstage. I wanted to do musical theater, and from that I realized I was interested in plays. I never imagined myself on television. I was so lucky to be onstage my whole life.
There's something about the alchemy of the show - the actors, the writers, the directors, the editors - that makes 'Parenthood' unique. You get so deeply embedded with these characters because you go through life with them, and that's our priority.
Acting is my true love. I would like to have been a serious actor, and I plan to in the next life. I'm gonna be Meryl Streep Rivers.
As an actor, it's a very strange adjustment to start playing the father. I was used to playing a kid my whole life, and then all of a sudden, it's like, boom. I guess when I let my hair go grey, things changed.
I have a wonderful wife I met at Rutgers while we were both there. She was in the Ph.D. program. She is not an actress. She definitely brings balance to my life. We actors can tend to bore anyone with shop talk.
