Looking back at her earlier career and the fame of her 1994 show My So-Called Life, Claire Danes admitted in an interview that she always took herself very seriously. “I think because I am as earnest as I am, people were accepting of my evolving into a certified, legitimate…grown up. “When I was 18, I [...]
Jenna Fischer [Blades of Glory; The Office] went to college as a pre-law history student, but in her junior year switched to a theater major. Since “there wasn’t a film/TV department at Truman State, Fischer and a few other students got a camcorder and started writing and editing shows that they would then present on [...]
Rainn Wilson radiates confidence Rainn Wilson discovered acting in a high school drama class, then moved to New York to study in NYU’s Graduate Acting Program, notes a new Los Angeles Times article [Revenge of the nerd, By Fred Schruers, March 22, 2007], and “filled the next decade with theater work, including Shakespeare and off-Broadway, [...]
In her novel about a late-19th-century actress, In America, Susan Sontag wrote, “She had loved being an actress because the theatre seemed to her nothing less than the truth. A higher truth. Acting in a play, one of the great plays, you became better than you really were. You said only words that were sculpted, [...]
Sarah Polley on fame In a recent article, film critic Kenneth Turan writes: Sarah Polley looks back on her decision to leave “Almost Famous” as a turning point in her life, a decision to keep fame at bay and have as normal a life as possible. “My first experience with a sliver of fame was [...]
Renée Zellweger on the protection of a character Speaking of her role in the new film “Miss Potter” as Beatrix Potter (1866–1943), the English author and illustrator of the Peter Rabbit books, Renée Zellweger [right] commented, “I’m not a performer. I don’t want to hop up on a stage and go ‘Look at me! I’m [...]
I had to sort of figure it out for myself Ellen Pompeo was four when her mother died, at age 33. A new article says “her five older siblings were dissolved in grief; her father.. was wracked by a sorrow he was unable to articulate.” It was “a very, very vivid, painful memory,” Pompeo says. [...]
In a recent interview for Reuters news, Ellen Burstyn commented, “Acting? I think it needs some help. TV has lowered the bar. With quicker schedules everything is rushed, so the quality gets lowered.” Burstyn won the Best Actress Academy Award for 1974′s “Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore” and has a total of six Oscar nominations, [...]
Joey Lauren Adams makes her feature film writing and directing debut with Come Early Morning, starring Ashley Judd. In a recent interview, she talks about how satisfying this new area of creative expression has been for her. Question: Is writing a script like this or any script for that matter in some ways a reaction [...]
Her character in “Casino Royale” is a woman of complexity, intellect and self-assurance. Eva Green has commented about some aspects of her life that help develop the kind of depth she has as a person to play such a role. “I am many things. I can be quite mad, and young, but I’m not the [...]
[Q: I really want to be a singer/actress, but how do u get started?] Hayden Panettiere: First, I would make sure that you really love it because it makes you happy and not because you love what you think you might get from it. It is hard work, but if you set your mind to [...]
Two of the top casting directors in the business, who most recently cast the new James Bond, Janet Hirshenson and Jane Jenkins reminisce about the many films they’ve cast, including Harry Potter, and A Beautiful Mind; the actors they’ve discovered, such as Tom Cruise, Leonardo DiCaprio and Scarlett Johansson; and some of the A-list directors, [...]
Masi Oka Masayori “Masi” Oka is an actor and digital effects artist, plays Hiro Nakamura in the NBC series Heroes, was born in Tokyo, graduated with a Bachelor of Science in computer science and mathematics with minor in theater arts from Brown University in 1997 and also works at George Lucas’ Industrial Light & Magic [...]
Evan Rachel Wood Evan Rachel Wood [“Running with Scissors”] recalls getting beat up in elementary school for being an actor. “I think it was because my SAG card fell out of my bag, and [the kids] asked what it was and I explained to them, and no more than ten minutes later I was getting [...]
Too embarassed to say ‘No’ Many actresses choose to promote themselves and their films through revealing and sexy magazine spreads. Much as we may enjoy them, for the “stars” of those sexy photos, it may not always be so positive. Jessica Biel [left] wrote a letter that appeared in the Jan. ’04 edition of Seventeen [...]
Therapy can help more than acting class “I’ve been going to therapy since I was twenty one. I think the more you know about your own psyche, the more you can know about other people’s, and can play them better.” Jennifer Jason Leigh ["Inside the Actors Studio" interview] Many other talented actors have used therapy [...]
Out of the comfort zone Many people, maybe most, want to avoid anxiety, fear and other “stressful” feelings. Except for the occasional roller coaster ride. But talented actors (and other artists) often use those kinds of feelings to guide and energize their work. Julia Stiles [left] says she chooses projects based on “ways I need [...]
Harry Dean Stanton – compelling authenticity “I play myself all the time… on camera and off. What else can I do?” Harry Dean Stanton [photo and quote from the HBO.com section for “Big Love”] Nicolas Cage thinks “Harry Dean exudes a spiritual awareness that’s steeped in deep sadness, and it’s so compelling to watch on [...]
Grace Zabriskie on obsessional mode Grace Zabriskie commented recently about the article In Praise of Positive Obsessions, by Eric Maisel, PhD, and on the value of reading. “I have for many years now extricated myself, without too much guilt, from social events with close friends by knowing I will be understood when I say that [...]
Annette Bening “There is that part of acting where you’re just interested in human behavior and interested in unconscious versus conscious motivation, that you can use your intellect to study, just as if you were a writer, or sociologist, or teacher… “But then what separates us as actors is that there’s this whole kind of [...]