Top 48 Quotes & Sayings by Ann Dowd

Anything or anyone that limits the dream you have for yourself and for your career is just to be dismissed. Do not keep that company, and do not hear those words.

My parents were strict but loving.

I think the theater is where you stand up, and you say, 'Here is what I have to offer.'

In my experience as an actor over so many years, I don't know when I have been touched so deeply on so many levels as I have been by 'The Leftovers' in my three years there. It is a profound exploration of life, of grief, of loss.

Sit with silence a lot - real silence, where nothing is happening - because you learn so much in those moments of quiet.

When I think of those in the 'far right' or those who are pro-life to the extreme and at all costs protect the unborn, the thing that enrages me is you want to ask every one of them, 'How many foster children are in your home now?'

In general, between an actor and a character, there needs to be a falling in love, if you will - which I'm saying in quotes.

The first 10 years of my education were spent at a Catholic school in Springfield, Mass.

I look at all these wonderful actors who are out of work, and I don't know what accounts for my good fortune, but I'm grateful for it.

TV is terrific. It's really fast paced which I find difficult.

I was so grateful to win an Emmy, but just being nominated, it's not overrated!

I think women are used to stepping up and getting the job done when you need to.

The day after Trump was elected, I happened to be home in New York. I went to bed for the day.

I was the second oldest of seven children, and chores were a way of life for us. If your task wasn't completed, you were called right back to finish it.

It's a question of dropping the armor and getting up and doing the work you want to do. And film at first is frightening because you are like, 'What's that camera doing?' But then it becomes family and therefore a really wonderful experience.

I have a family and children I adore and a husband who's wonderful.

I think 'The Leftovers' is one of the most extraordinary shows that has ever seen the light of day.

I had been a premed student, and the way you got through premed was to work extremely hard and then harder.

I remember, as a young Catholic girl in high school, seeing 'The Exorcist,' and it scared the wits out of me.

My father, John, ran the Dowd Insurance Co. in town, which was started by his great-grandfather. My mother, Dolores, was a homemaker who kept an eye on all of us.

Life gets more interesting as it goes on. It becomes fuller because there is perspective there.

All I ever wanted was a successful career as an actress.

Forgiveness, in some cases, is a flipping miracle in the sense that you're fighting, and suddenly something happens. It's a kind of grace. Whether you believe in God or not, something happens, and it's transformative.

Wherever the career wasn't going the way I wanted it to, I would experience those disappointments, and I would put them somewhere where I could say, 'Come on now, you're still working. Keep your focus where it belongs.'

I have to say my background was mostly theatre, which I love, and it took a long time to feel comfortable there. That's probably true of anyone's career.

When I was pregnant with my first child, I was 35 years old, and I was working in a pet shop.

The first time I read 'Leftovers,' I didn't get it at all.

Two of my aunts are Catholic sisters.

When I won the Emmy, the profound sense of gratitude when my name was said I cannot express enough. It was one of the most beautiful moments, hands down, of my life.

It's a funny thing about being raised Catholic and then going to Catholic schools with nuns - the cliche about the mean nun was not what I had at all. They were very, very smart, devoted individuals.

In actor's career, I had a fair amount of denial, which I think is possibly in the genes, where I just couldn't go to, "Maybe this won't work out." I just couldn't do it. My mind just refused to go there. I don't mean there weren't low periods. There were plenty. But I remember arriving in New York and I was maybe 32, and I didn't have an agent. I came from Chicago, where I had gone to school and worked and got my sea legs, so to speak, and I remember walking out of the subway, walking the streets, standing in front of the theater and saying, "I will work in this theater."

Damon Lindelof is hypnotizing. His imagination is without limits, and Tom Perrotta, as well. You begin to just trust, completely, where the story is going, knowing that you're entirely safe in the truthfulness of it.

I can say that I am, by nature, optimistic.

The first day of shooting, you always want to turn around and go home and say, "What was I thinking?!," and put your head under a pillow and weep. I could maybe go five weeks, and then the nerves would set in about when the next job was going to happen.

The great thing about an independent film is that you're too busy working, and you're too busy hoping to God to get it done.

I always felt like a successful actor when I got a job.

It took a very long time to really enjoy an audition, and to get in the room and do the best that I can. I've just been deeply grateful for my career, and that the love for the work and the characters is alive still. I try to let go of the armor as much as possible and not be afraid.

The work for the actor is always the same. We're looking for a human being. We're looking for believable human behavior.

The Leftovers was an absolutely extraordinary experience. After the first season of learning to work with Damon Lindelof and Tom Perrotta, and all of the writers, you didn't question it because it all made sense. Because Damon knows those characters so well and has thought it through so well, there was never a time that I asked a question where it wasn't answered fully.

At some point you realize, I have dreams. I would love to be working on wonderful roles, in wonderful films, with people I respect and admire. And that will come in its time. In the meantime, "Pay attention to your work. Get better at what you do." That's my job.

I love the roles that I'm having the chance to play, and I've learned to just let go a little. Children teach you that, every day. Life is large, so do the best you can and move on. Do everything you can in a given day, and then let it go.

I was educated by nuns. None of them, of course, did anything resembling the actions of Lydia from The Handmaid's Tale, but they taught me a work ethic, that I had to toe the line, that I had to step up and do my work, and that we would stay until it was done, and that came from a devotion to making you the best person you can be. That's the take I have on Lydia. She knows her actions are firm and sometimes very harsh, but she also looks after them.

The lovely thing is that now being offered things is just a blast. In the beginning, I'd be offered something and be like, "What? What do you mean? Are they sure?" And now, I have less shock about it. It's just a real pleasure. It's a privilege.

I guess getting older has its benefits, one of them being perspective.

To me, being an actor is the best job in the land, next to being a mother and having a family and a husband. I just think it's the realization of, "Hey, this is the greatest situation in the world."

My basic thought about actors, and I would say this to my students - I love to teach, but I haven't in awhile because I've been fortunate enough to be working - that, "If this is the work you love, there is work for you. That's how the world works. That's the attitude you have to go in there with. You just have to know that it's coming."

There are so many fantastic roles, but the ones that have always drawn me to them are the loners who, for whatever reason, never quite fit in and knew it and had to find their own way. I've always been drawn to that, for some reason. I've always been drawn to that sad, isolated place, but what it produces in behavior is something else, entirely. For whatever reason, I'm drawn to these people. Essentially, I think what draws me is that they are survivors against rather considerable odds.

I think aging is underrated. As you grow older, you have perspective and you realize just how fortunate you are to be working. To be working with the people I've had the chances to work with, I honestly feel like the most fortunate person in the world. I think it's hugely important when you work to bring with you that spirit, which includes and immense sense of gratitude. How that translates into behavior is just to bring your energy, your good spirit and your appreciation, and do your homework and really listen to the person in front of you.