When you're doing a play you get to go full speed ahead, all night, in front of an audience. It's a roller-coaster ride, responding to other actors, it feeds you.
I always knew I wanted to be an actor. I was talented in college but not the most talented. But I knew I wanted to do it, and that intention got me there and kept me there.
As an actor, you want to keep your demons to some extent, but you also have to exorcise them so you can use them instead of them using you.
It was actually a relief for me to play an actor who was scared, who didn't know where everything was, who didn't know what buttons to push, and for me to be able to play all that.
I'm an actor, so I am always scared. You never know if you are on vacation or that you have been retired and they just didn't tell you.
I am a greedy actor in the sense that I like the big bites. Put a big fat steak in front of me, and I will eat it.
I'm more of a writer than an actor, and I used to say that I'm mostly an improviser, though I haven't improvised in awhile.
I always wanted to do a Hollywood story. The thing about actors, though, is that they go through a streak of roles. The question is, what's in between?
I think audiences like to see their favorite actor handle himself physically on screen, however he does it. He can wrestle, or box, or he can know karate.
Actors do tend to get pigeonholed. People want to know who you are so they can put you in a box. It's lovely to be known for such diametrically opposite roles.
It's no fun to be a struggling young actor. It's a desperate thing, no way to be happy. If you have any alternative, you should take it.
When I'm acting, I like to think of myself as a non-actor, and a non-drummer when I'm drumming. It frees you up to not care how well you do.
I would do 'John Carter' again tomorrow. I'm very proud of 'John Carter.' Box office doesn't validate me as a person, or as an actor.
'Killer Joe' provides a lot of red meat for the theater. Pam MacKinnon is the perfect director to shepherd a group of actors who share a certain bloodlust.
I'm an actor, and I like having attention, I guess. There's a reason I like being on stage. There's a reason I like being in front of a camera. It's that interaction.
I don't put the pressure on myself to be a very successful movie star. I want to enjoy being an actor and I want to be challenged by the roles I take.
When I'm writing, I'm writing for a particular actor. When a lot of writers are writing, they're writing an idea. So they're not really writing in a specific voice.
There's acting, and then there's auditioning; mastering auditioning is sort of the first thing an actor really needs to nail down when he or she wants to get a part.
Actors don't listen to each other. You're so obsessed with what you're saying or doing that the other person could be talking in Swahili and you wouldn't know.
I literally came to L.A. like every actor does from this little town with this big dream, and I'm living in it now. It's mind-blowing.
I can understand why people get annoyed at being remembered for one thing, but a lot of actors aren't remembered for anything. I don't mind that.
