You'll work hard to create characters that are compelling and unforgettable. But in the end, it's the story that matters.
My job is to help the functioning of the story, not to draw attention to myself, but to make my characters function within the story, to work for the benefit of the story, to make the whole thing work.
I'm always envious of the actors who get to come to work every day and really grow deep roots there, but it is really fun playing lots of different characters.
I know that some people work differently, but I have to work from the inside out. It doesn't matter how big the character is, there has to be a truthful core.
I'm a performer. I push the envelope, I work in a very uncontrolled manner onstage. I do a lot of free association, it's spontaneous, I go into character.
Well, I think in my own work the subject matter usually deals with characters I know, aspects of myself, friends of mine - that sort of thing.
I never wanted to look back on my career and be embarrassed about work that I chose to do. I never wanted to look at character I've done and cringe.
Character is the indelible mark that determines the only true value of all people and all their work.
I come from the theater, and I've done a lot of character work in the theater, but Hollywood stuff in film and TV, they've been more leading lady/ingenue type roles.
We work with every one of them to see if their character wouldn't say a certain thing or if something is worded awkwardly - we work with them to rectify that.
If you look at my body of work, there's always a dark side to my characters. They've always got a skeleton in the closet; they've always got a subtext.
If you look at my body of work, my characters drastically vary, and so I typically don't play the same role. It makes me feel reborn with each role.
What I'm mainly interested in is not having women characters that have to be perfect, obviously. That's something I feel strongly about and have that in every single thing I've ever done.
There are so many female roles - particularly for young women - that are just somebody's girlfriend or somebody's daughter, or that are accessories to the main story rather than being three-dimensional characters.
There is more for women in terms of character roles now. Judi Dench and Maggie Smith have constantly changed over the years and challenged themselves with different roles. That's impressive.
I find women as writers and as characters are operating within narrow confines. They inherit a kind of ghetto of the soul. I'm trying to enlarge the spectrum.
I would certainly choose my jobs depending on the actions of the character. I won't do anything that has to do with child abuse or women's abuse.
It's more acceptable for guys to get old and craggy and become wonderful character actors as they get older, but women aren't allowed to get old and craggy in the same way.
From its beginning, fan fiction has been written mostly by women. Originally, this was because of a dearth of interesting female characters in conventional sci-fi.
Always dream big and dare to believe!
As long as I didn't say it aloud, it wasn't real
