Personal discipline is a most powerful character quality and one worthy of dedicating your life to nurturing.
But if you don't understand that story is character and not just idea, you will not be able to breathe life into even the most intriguing flash of inspiration.
Animals are stylized characters in a kind of old saga - stylized because even the most acute of them have little leeway as they play out their parts.
It seemed to me... that the only valid people to deal with crime were cops, and I would like to make the lead character, rather than a single person, a squad of cops.
I know that all cops are not sterling characters. But you have to have someone to root for. I balance it with rotten cops who will take a bribe, who will beat somebody up.
Before I started to make films, I didn't give much thought to the way the characters were physically positioned in the story world.
Psychopaths... people who know the differences between right and wrong, but don't give a shit. That's what most of my characters are like.
In the original script, my character was a basketball player rather than a boxer. I didn't think I could pull that off. I'm a little short to be a basketball player!
I'm naturally going to react to that and he'll bring out elements in my musical character that were lying dormant, because I'm relating what he's playing.
I believe in books. I believe more in 'cross-media' - how characters are adapting across mediums.
I was brought up on Dickens. I remember reading 'Bleak House' but, coming back to it, I didn't remember much about it apart from a few characters.
I really enjoyed playing Vinny Vedecci, the Italian talk show host. He was the first character I ever came up with where I gave him a name and a way of dressing.
I'm a character actor, so I don't take the hit if the movie's bad, the lead does. So, I don't want to be the lead. He takes the hit, I don't.
The interesting part of the process is developing the character, you know, why did he become that? Why is the guy a murderer, or why is this guy a pervert, or whatever he is. So that's the fun part for me to delve into the abyss.
Singing is an incredible expression and something that is important to me, but where I feel comfortable with how much I reveal about myself is acting. I enjoy the characters, the costumes, the wigs and just being a chameleon.
It's just I hate reading the description 'offbeat' about a character in a script, because I, along with Seth Green, Jamie Kennedy and a few others, have cornered the market on 'offbeat.'
People who change history and their generation are willing to endure and overcome ridicule, rejection, character assassination and being talked about. Don't settle for mediocre.
I find all of my performances come down to mathematics in a sense - how do you approach the problem of this character? Sometimes I crack that problem, sometimes I don't.
I've dropped myself into straightforward character pieces in order to explore that form and reap its values. But you are sort of restricted visually when your first requirement is to tell a fairly straightforward story.
As I read, I start to form clear ideas of the characters and allow myself to be a proper conduit for this author's voice so that you will feel you have been on a seductive audio journey.
It was important to have a similar energy in my performance. To make the character too different would have just been about my ego because it didn't need to be drastically different.
