I'm always happy when actors get rich, because the odds on it are so long!
You can ruin your life wanting to be an actor.
One of the things that is assumed about actors is that they are extrovert, which is almost never the case, in my experience.
Actors always talk about taking their work home and I always think: 'What are you on? You just turn it off. You are at work and then you go home.'
There are a lot of actors that are more talented than me at Second City who quit it before they even got to a paying status. Weird luck. I had no other option.
Whenever I think of the high salaries we are paid as film actors, I think it is for the travel, the time away, and any trouble you get into through being well known. It's not for the acting, that's for sure.
I was into writing and directing. I was a bit of a reluctant actor. I would always ask friends to shoot or direct their movies, but then they'd want me to be in them.
We actors can't take the credit. We love to try to claim the credit.
It might sound glib, but in a sense, as an actor Im a journalist and a psychologist recording life and truth.
As an actor, you think you have to go really far and deep and cry and yell to be good in a scene. Sometimes that's not the point.
It was always my intention to direct. I went to film school. And then I wanted to know how to work with actors, so I went to acting school. And then by the end of that, I caught the bug.
Even the greatest actors have had dry spells where they've wondered if they were going to work again.
For the longest time I have had so much belief and confidence in myself, which as an actor you need, because the entertainment industry is incredible competitive, brutal, and unpredictable just when you start to think you know what's going on.
I have always been of the mind that good work is good work, whether performed on stage, on television or in film and, like any reasonable actor, I keep my options open.
Part of my aspiration as a film actor is to bring subtlety to everything I do - honesty but subtlety.
I find that most of us actors can't stand ourselves in any form.
Your job as an actor is to stay employed.
I like getting carried away by what is happening and then decide each scene based on the actors, the set and the light.
I had the privilege of being able to choose, or at least have the opportunity to work at, being anything but an actor.
I feel that TV and film feed off each other well. It's more in the perception of the viewer than it is of the actor.
Kevin Feige said to me: "I don't think we've ever put an actor through quite as much as this, physically and mentally." I'll wear that as a badge of honour. It was endless.
When I finished my A-levels, I assumed I'd be able to get work as an actor. But I couldn't. I didn't get an audition. Nothing. So I thought I'd better train and then the parts would come.
Keats himself spoke about how Shakespeare was capable of erasing himself completely from the characters he had created. As an actor, that is what I'm trying to do.
I don't even want to think of myself as an actor because it's such an insecure place to go.
If I could work with any actor it would have to be Johnny Depp. He is cool.
