I love being around great actors and film-makers, and I try to hide the fact that I'm in awe of them.
I don't attribute an actor's great success to their own individual performance when it's something as collaborative as a movie.
We've all seen great actors and actresses who are missing a certain chemistry. And it's not about getting along or not getting along.
One of the great things about being an actor is that you have a completely different challenge every few months.
Britain produces great actors because they learn on stage so know their stuff when they get on a movie set.
A great actor is independent of the poet, because the supreme essence of feeling does not reside in prose or in verse, but in the accent with which it is delivered.
It's what I learn from the great actors that I work with. Stillness. That's all and that's the hardest thing.
We had a great dramatic society in school, and that's where I first got exposure both as an actor and director.
If you are a great dramatic actor then you often don't know if people are enjoying your stuff at all because they are sitting there in silence.
You can have a bunch of great actors in a film, but if you don't have anyone telling a great story, it's a moot point.
Show me a great actor and I'll show you a lousy husband. Show me a great actress, and you've seen the devil.
I think that if you're improvising on TV, it's a great way to help the dialogue between actors and writers.
I know all actors are different, but I've never sat down and asked the writers, 'Where are we headed? Am I good or bad?'
My passion is becoming involved in good work, whether that means as an actor or writer or director or producer or all - that is not as important to me.
I really think that as good of a job as you do as a writer, you're absolutely indebted to the actors that have to deliver that material.
I really have the good fortune that the actors who work with me on 'The Leftovers' are thoughtful, hard working, open people and generous people.
Actors want to surprise themselves. When it's really good, you kind of transcend yourself, and that happens infrequently. Very, very rarely.
I was sick and tired of being an English actor who did a lot of American movies because I was cheap and good.
Nicolas Cage is a great actor and he's done some good action movies too.
To be able to work with actors who are doing such good work, not only makes it easier for you, but it makes you better.
I know actors who have had to turn down good roles because they just don't pay enough. It's hard.
