110 Actors Quotes

Following is our list of actors quotations and slogans full of insightful wisdom and perspective about inspiring acting.

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Famous Actors Quotes

When I played Robin Hood, I knew the great role was Alan Rickman's and it didn't bother me. I always think that leading actors should be called the best supporting actors. β€” Kevin Costner

The best actors instinctively feel out what the other actors need, and they just accommodate it. β€” Christopher Nolan

Actors should arouse a sense of wonder because of their ability to exceed what the spectators can envision ever being able to do. β€” Jerzy Grotowski

Remember: there are no small parts, only small actors. β€” Konstantin Stanislavisky

Remember: there are no small parts, only small actors. - Constantin Stanislavski

Remember: there are no small parts, only small actors. β€” Constantin Stanislavski

Actors are rogues and vagabonds. Or they ought to be. β€” Helen Mirren

The real actor has a direct line to the collective heart. β€” Bette Davis

An actor is an actor is an actor. The less personality an actor has off stage the better. A blank canvas on which to draw the characters he plays. β€” Arthur Lowe

All the best performers bring to their role something more, something different than what the author put on paper. That's what makes theatre live. That's why it persists. β€” Stephen Sondheim

The actor should not play a part. Like the Aeolian harps that used to be hung in the trees to be played only by the breeze, the actor should be an instrument played upon by the character he depicts. β€” Alla Nazimova

It's the actors who are prepared to make fools of themselves who are usually the ones who come to mean something to the audience. β€” Christian Bale

Acting in a scene is like paddling a canoe from a pebbly beach on to the river, the writer builds the canoe, and the actor provides the river. The river is the actor's thoughts and emotions. β€” Sanford Meisner

Film actors reach a certain level, but they don't get beyond it unless they work in the theater. β€” Shirley Knight

An actor without techies is a naked person standing in the dark trying to emote. A techie without actors is a person with marketable skills. β€” Mark Leslie

Work for the actor lies essentially in two areas: the ability to consistently create reality and the ability to express that reality. β€” Lee Strasberg

Short Actors Quotes

  • Acting is behaving truthfully under imaginary circumstances. β€” Sanford Meisner
  • Unless the theatre can ennoble you, make you a better person, you should flee from it. β€” Constantin Stanislavski
  • You'll never see any two good actors approach a role in the same way. β€” Constantin Stanislavski
  • I want to be one of the biggest social media stars ever to become an actor. β€” Jake Paul
  • We're improv comedians, we're not necessarily actors, we don't come across that way. β€” Joe Gatto
  • A magician is only an actor - an actor pretending to be a magician. β€” Harry Houdini
  • You have film actors doing TV, rap stars doing TV, with everyone kind of crossing the line. β€” Anthony Michael Hall
  • When I was a kid, if a guy got killed in a western movie I always wondered who got his horse. β€” George Carlin
  • WHY is the most important word in an actor's vocabulary. β€” Sanford Meisner
  • Everything changes once we identify with being the witness to the story, instead of the actor in it. β€” Ram Dass

Actors Image Quotes

I have always been a Malibu Man, like all actors. - Nick Mancuso quote

I have always been a Malibu Man, like all actors. β€” Nick Mancuso

If I wasn't an actor, I'd be a secret agent. - Elijah Wood quote

If I wasn't an actor, I'd be a secret agent. β€” Elijah Wood

You grow up in a Sicilian household, becoming an actor is not a big leap. - Vincent Schiavelli quote

You grow up in a Sicilian household, becoming an actor is not a big leap. β€” Vincent Schiavelli

Disney has the best casting. If he doesn't like an actor he just tears him up. - Alfred Hitchcock quote

Disney has the best casting. If he doesn't like an actor he just tears him up. β€” Alfred Hitchcock

Actors quote When an actor marries an actress they both fight for the mirror.
When an actor marries an actress they both fight for the mirror.

Actors Quotes

Of course, if you have thought up to now that an actor relies merely on inspiration you will have to change your mind. Talent without work is nothing more than raw unfinished material. β€” Constantin Stanislavski

Preparing a character is the opposite of building-it is a demolishing, removing brick by brick everything in the actor's muscles, ideas and inhibitions that stands between him and the part, until one day, with a great rush of air, the character invades his every pore. β€” Peter Brook

Being an actor is a religious calling because you've been given the ability, the gift to inspire humanity. Think about that on the way to your soap opera audition. β€” Sanford Meisner

The inner life of the [imagination], and not the personal and tiny experiential resources of the actor, should be elaborated on the stage and shown to the audience. This life is rich and revealing for the audience as well as for the actor himself. β€” Michael Chekhov

The ladder of success in Hollywood is usually a press agent, actor, director, producer, leading man; and you are a star if you sleep with each of them in that order. Crude, but true. β€” Hedy Lamarr

An actor must interpret life, and in order to do so he must be willing to accept all experiences that life can offer. β€” Marlon Brando

An actor is totally vulnerable. His total personality is exposed to critical judgment - his intellect, his bearing, his diction, his whole appearance. In short, his ego. β€” Sir Alec Guinness

I'm living every ten-year-old boy's fantasy. The other day, Chris and I had this big scene where we had to pull out our guns, and I was thinking, 'Here we are in New York City - a place where every actor wants to be - and we are literally playing cops and robbers. How great is that?' β€” Mariska Hargitay

You know, the period of World War I and the Roaring Twenties were really just about the same as today. You worked, and you made a living if you could, and you tired to make the best of things. For an actor or a dancer, it was no different then than today. It was a struggle. β€” James Cagney

My cameraman and I devised a method, which we started using from my second film, which applies mainly to day scenes shot in the studio, where we used bounced light instead of direct light. We agreed with this thing of four or five shadows following the actors is dreadful. β€” Satyajit Ray

Inspiring Acting Quotes

Do the right thing because it is right. - Immanuel Kant

Do the right thing because it is right. β€” Immanuel Kant

Patience is power. Patience is not an absence of action; rather it is "timing" it waits on the right time to act, for the right principles and in the right way. β€” Fulton J. Sheen

My wish for you is that you continue. Continue to be who and how you are, to astonish a mean world with your acts of kindness. β€” Maya Angelou

Great moves of God are usually preceded by simple acts of obedience. β€” Steven Furtick

Faith is not something you have to get. It's something that you, as a bornagain child of God, already have. Act on it by releasing it to God. That's when your healing starts! β€” Oral Roberts

Put your heart, mind, and soul into even your smallest acts. This is the secret of success. β€” Sivananda

Love means to commit oneself without guarantee, to give oneself completely in the hope that our love will produce love in the loved person. Love is an act of faith, and whoever is of little faith is also of little love. β€” Erich Fromm

We've all got both light and dark inside us. What matters is the part we choose to act on. That's who we really are. β€” J. K. Rowling

Desire to see God, be fearful of losing Him, and find joy in everything that can lead to Him. If you act in this way, you will always live in great peace. β€” Teresa of Avila

Everything you do right now ripples outward and affects everyone. Your posture can shine your heart or transmit anxiety. Your breath can radiate love or muddy the room in depression. Your glance can awaken joy. Your words can inspire freedom. Your every act can open hearts and minds. β€” David Deida

Inspiring Actor Quotes

It is highly possible that what is called 'talented behavior' is simply a greater individual capacity for experiencing. From this point of view, it is in the increasing of the individual capacity for experiencing that the untold potentiality of a personality can be evoked. β€” Viola Spolin

More than in any other performing arts the lack of respect for acting seems to spring from the fact that every layman considers himself a valid critic. β€” Simone Weil

One of the things I like about my profession, and that I find healthy, is that one constantly has to break oneself to pieces. β€” Liv Ullmann

Find in yourself those human things which are universal. - Sanford Meisner

Find in yourself those human things which are universal. β€” Sanford Meisner

Be so good they can't ignore you. β€” Steve Martin

Who the hell wants to hear actors talk? β€” Harry Warner

The more you do your homework, the more you're free to be intuitive. But you've got to put the work in. β€” Edward Norton

Keep your friends close, but your enemies closer. β€” Mario Puzo

If you really do want to be an actor who can satisfy himself and his audience, you need to be vulnerable. β€” Jack Lemmon

The thing about performance, even if it's only an illusion, is that it is a celebration of the fact that we do contain within ourselves infinite possibilities. β€” Sydney Smith

Supporting Roles Quotes

Provide lots of opportunities for children's natural curiosity to manifest itself. With very young children, our role is one of supporter and guide. β€” Lilian Katz

It's really hard to get stories made that are about women. Not just women being obsessed with men, or supporting men. And it's really hard to get men to be a part of films that are about women in a leading role. I'm really interested in how we can adjust that. β€” Olivia Wilde

Far from creating independent thinkers, schools have always, throughout history, played an institutional role in a system of control and coercion. And once you are well educated you have already been socialized in ways that support the power structure, which, in turn, rewards you immensely. β€” Noam Chomsky

Social networking is playing a huge role in creating awareness and mobilizing support for all kinds of common interests. What better way to use this remarkable tool than to change the world? β€” Natalie Portman

I think a lot of the time in films, men get roles where they create their own destiny and women are just tools, supporters for that. β€” Elliot Page

I've always thought that people need to feel good about themselves and I see my role as offering support to them, to provide some light along the way. β€” Leo Buscaglia

It's easier in some ways being on the life raft and the other guy's in the boat and you can row alongside and be supportive. In some ways, that's an easier role. β€” Sayings

Girl Scouts offered a wonderful group of girls where common concerns and interests could come together. We could learn, be challenged, and support one another. It was a very positive aspect of my life and played an important role in shaping who I am today. β€” Judy Woodruff

Disneyland is the star, everything else is in the supporting role. β€” Walt Disney

Give role players love. Praise can be most valuable when it’s merited by someone whose supporting role is often overlooked β€” Bill Parcells

People Writing About Actors

Name Quotes Likes
Read quotes by Constantin Stanislavski

Constantin Stanislavski
quotes on acting

51 2499
Read quotes by Sanford Meisner

Sanford Meisner

35 1126
Read quotes by Kevin Costner

Kevin Costner

133 625
Read quotes by Christopher Nolan

Christopher Nolan
quotes on filmmaking, movies

95 848
Read quotes by Jerzy Grotowski

Jerzy Grotowski

9 750
Read quotes by Konstantin Stanislavisky

Konstantin Stanislavisky

16 1060

More Actors Quotes

The more we understand what is happening in the world, the more frustrated we often become, for our knowledge leads to feelings of powerlessness. We feel that we are living in a world in which the citizen has become a mere spectator or a forced actor, and that our personal experience is politically useless and our political will a minor illusion. β€” C. Wright Mills

An actor is totally vulnerable. His total personality is exposed to critical judgment - his intellect, his bearing, his diction, his whole appearance. In short, his ego. β€” Alec Guinness

Get real. You are not the star of the movie. Most of what happens around you isn’t about you at all. There are infinite numbers of other movies. In those, if you feature at all, you’re just a supporting actor. It would really help your happiness if you started to look at your life that way. β€” Mo Gawdat

The thing about film-making is I give it everything, that's why I work so hard. I always tell young actors to take charge. It's not that hard. Sign your own cheques, be responsible. β€” Tom Cruise

I want to run for the Senate from Tennessee. Not now, but when I'm 50, when music dies down a little bit. I know lots of artists and actors have those delusions of grandeur, but ever since I was a kid, it's been of interest to me. β€” Tim McGraw

A government institution called the Finnish Film Foundation funds filmmaking there, and I wrote several screenplays but never got any money. They were sent back to me, and they said that they were too commercial for them. β€” Renny Harlin

There's editing, and scripts to read and edit, and casting, and all the elements of production that just sort of take up the normal downtime that you would have as an actor. So there's not a lot of that for me. β€” Richard Dean Anderson

I think I'm good at amplifying an actor's strengths, and minimizing their weaknesses. And they all have strengths and weaknesses. β€” Steven Soderbergh

All these social media sites allow us to confuse truth and popularity. That has to be fixed. Because every normal citizen has a right to know what is factual versus what is amplified by good actors or bad actors. β€” Chamath Palihapitiya

You either learn your way towards writing your own script in life, or you unwittingly become an actor in someone else's script. β€” John Taylor Gatto

My childhood was really nice. My parents never forced me to do anything; it was always, "If you want to do that, fine." When I told my father I was going to be an actor, he said, "Fine, but study welding just in case." β€” Robin Williams

The way I saw it was, if I had the built-in following and the audience, but I also had the skill set of acting, that would shoot me to the top. Because there's so many good actors. There's so many good-looking people. But the X factor now is social media. β€” Jake Paul

The balcony is a metaphor for a mental and emotional place of perspective, calm, and self-control. If life is a stage and we are all actors on that stage, then the balcony is a place from which we can see the entire play unfolding with greater clarity. To observe ourselves, it is valuable to go to the balcony at all times, and especially before, during, and after any problematic conversation or negotiation. β€” William Ury

The actor has to develop his body. The actor has to work on his voice. But the most important thing the actor has to work on is his mind. β€” Stella Adler

I'm a frustrated actor. My ... goal is to beat Alfred Hitchcock in the number of cameos. I'm going to try to break his record. β€” Stan Lee

There is a strange pecking order among actors. Theatre actors look down on film actors, who look down on TV actors. Thank God for reality shows, or we wouldn't have anybody to look down on. β€” George Clooney

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