Acting is about giving something away, handing yourself over to whatever role you are asked to play. I'm not hiding read more

Acting is about giving something away, handing yourself over to whatever role you are asked to play. I'm not hiding or escaping or seeking anonymity. I reserve the right not to have a rubber stamp on my forehead saying this is who I am. Because who I am gets in the way of people looking innocently at the parts I play.

I sweat. If anything comes easy to me I mistrust it.

I sweat. If anything comes easy to me I mistrust it.

There still remains to mortify a wit
The many-headed monster of the pit.

There still remains to mortify a wit
The many-headed monster of the pit.

I’ve been offered a lot but I want to stay away from romance, comedies and fluffy work. I met Stephen read more

I’ve been offered a lot but I want to stay away from romance, comedies and fluffy work. I met Stephen Spielberg at a breast cancer benefit and he explained that he’d seen me on Saturday Night Live and thought I was ready for a movie. He said, ‘You go to the ledge and are unafraid to jump off.’ That was the biggest compliment to me because he was saying I was free.

But as for all the rest,
There's hardly one (I may say none) who stands the Artist's test.
read more

But as for all the rest,
There's hardly one (I may say none) who stands the Artist's test.
The Artist is a rare, rare breed. There were but two, forsooth,
In all me time (the stage's prime!) and The Other One was Booth.

Prologues like compliments are loss of time;
'Tis penning bows and making legs in rhyme.

Prologues like compliments are loss of time;
'Tis penning bows and making legs in rhyme.

This many-headed monster.

This many-headed monster.

I think I love and reverence all arts equally, only putting my
own just above the others; because in read more

I think I love and reverence all arts equally, only putting my
own just above the others; because in it I recognize the union
and culmination of my own. To me it seems as if when God
conceived the world, that was Poetry; He formed it, and that was
Sculpture; He colored it, and that was Painting; He peopled it
with living beings, and that was the grand, divine, eternal
Drama.

On the stage he was natural, simple, affecting
'Twas only that when he was off, he was acting.

On the stage he was natural, simple, affecting
'Twas only that when he was off, he was acting.