Top 58 Quotes & Sayings by Chris Messina

You don't get to rehearse much on TV. You are kind of rehearsing on film. Depending on the way you work, that's either a good thing or a bad thing.

A lot of acting, as I grew up wanting to do, is kind of like magic... I'm not comparing myself to him in the least bit, but if you knew what Daniel Day-Lewis was doing every step of the way and what he was eating, I don't think when he popped up as Lincoln we would quite believe it.

I like to eat.

One of the interesting parts of being on a television show is you often don't know the fate of your character until you're reading the script. I always look forward to finding out.

The main thing about doing a comedy is that you spend most of your days really happy and laughing.

I like funny things, but I don't find myself particularly funny.

When you do a movie, you shoot, and then you go away. A lot of the times you walk about from the movie, you say, 'Oh, I get that scene now... Oh, that whole ending - I wish I could have done another shot.'

I was in a movie called 'Before & After' with Meryl Streep. I was edited out of the movie, but no one told me. I think I was 18 or 19 years old. I sat across from her and asked her every question about acting. I completely embarrassed myself.

For the longest time, I was always like a guy that people would think they went to high school with. They'd be like, 'How do I know you?' After, we'd play a guessing game. I'd say, 'I'm an actor,' and they'd go, 'Oh, what have you been in?' I'd list my credits, and they wouldn't really remember me.

I'm from another time period. E-mailing sometimes, for me, is difficult.

There's been a lot of times that I thought I'd never work again; I was really bummed out.

I'm lucky to just be a working actor. There are so many great actors out there and I'm just lucky to have gotten work.

When I'm doing a drama, I like to find the comedy; when I'm doing a comedy, I like to find the heart and drama.

I honestly think comedy is probably the hardest stuff to do.

What's monotonous about being an actor and often makes me want to throw in the towel or drive a car off a bridge is the auditioning - the waiting around.

'The Mindy Project' is really best when you're loose, and we improvise a lot, and that's what's best.

I think Aaron Sorkin is like Shakespeare. When you go through it, there is a rhythm and clues all over the place of how it should be played.

I like romance in films. I like love in films.

The truth is really funny. It's uncomfortable sometimes, it's dramatic sometimes, but it's really funny. Life is funny.

That is the fun of being an actor. You play all different kinds of people.

I was so bad in school that acting gave me some kind of identity and gave me a home.

Ultimately, making movies, if you don't have a big star, it's hard to do. Or if it's not a star director.

It's always flattering when somebody you really respect and like wants you to be involved in their project - let alone writes a part with your voice in mind.

I did a lot of small black-box theater in New York when I was starting out. I'd get a group of actors together to do workshops and readings. And I ended up directing three or four productions.

Doing something like 'Damages,' I played a character with post-traumatic stress. I was playing with sleep deprivation. I was not sleeping; I stayed up for three days at a time, drinking Red Bull. I would get shaky and tired and hyper.

I don't have much interest in gingerbread houses - except in eating them.

I'm not a cook. I don't think I ever will be.

I think as an actor, you're constantly putting yourself out there, and a lot of times failing - and failing in front of a bunch of people - and sometimes you have a good moment and something clicks.

If you're playing your character and you're running into all these people who know who you are and treat you in a way that doesn't pertain at all to the character, it takes you out of it more, so when you're alone in a city where people don't know you, you can kind of pretend even more and get into the head space of where you need to be.

When you do a play, you do it for a couple months, and it just gets in your bones. You can learn about somebody that way.

I don't know if women gravitate toward me, or I gravitate toward them.

I'm from Long Island. Strong Island.

I haven't watched a lot of television, but when I was kid, I watched 'All in the Family,' and I liked Archie and Edith a lot.

Yeah, I think everybody has the crises of questioning themselves at some point or other in their lives. Is this where I should live? The job I should have? The girl I should be dating? Is this the friend I should have?

I've spent so much of my youth trying to change people or change girls and then having it done to me and people wanting me to change.

I like talking about acting. I'm comfortable talking about acting.

I love 'Boardwalk Empire.' I really love that world. I love that style. I love all the actors on it.

I would love to close my eyes and see myself with my girlfriend when we're 99 years old and I have a pipe and she's knitting a sweater, and I hope that's the way it goes. I think it's a challenge every day.

I am a big fan of movies from the '70s.

My mom was a dance teacher, so she put me in dance school when I was a kid. I did everything. I used to take ballet.

How precise you need to be when you're in a comedy, and the honesty you need and to have those two things meet up and have the execution just right, I always found very difficult.

Honestly, one of my favorite things about a director is when they understand what an actor brings to their role.

When you go to a college for acting, at least the college I went to, it's like everybody just singing and dancing and acting, and they all come together, and everyone's talking about head shots... It just turned me off. I was like, 'What is this? I don't understand this. People are singing in the hallways.'

Probably the best part about being an actor is that you get to be a traveling wanderer.

As corny as it sounds, I'm often pinching myself going, 'What great opportunities and great parts and great people that I've gotten to work with.'

Well, it's always strange to kiss someone with 10, 20, 40 people around.

Look at what your idea of success would be. The more that you take in external motivators, the more it reduces your ultimate satisfaction because it doesn't come from inside.

I was shooting on The Mindy Project while I was editing Alex of Venice, which was the stupidest thing I could've done. It was like having two full-time jobs. But in editing some characters were dropped, some storylines were dropped. It just starts dictating what it's supposed to be.It's scary, but fun to try to be brave and to "kill your darlings." To get rid of the stuff that you were like, "Oh, I'll never get rid of that. I love that. As long of a take as it is, I'm gonna keep that in."

You live through the play at 8 o'clock, straight through, and nobody can call "Cut!" But also with the stage you're getting instant reactions. You hear people snoring in the audience, and bored to tears, or sometimes you hear the laughter, and you can hear them listening.

Nothing is as it seems; everything is as you allow it to be

Invented the #hashtag.

I am a big fan of movies from the ’70s.

My wife Jennifer Todd, who's a producer. She runs Matt Damon and Ben Affleck's company, and she produced Memento, and Boiler Room, and Prime, and Across the Universe... and Alice in Wonderland... She's really smart, and very helpful. That was nice, because I was super neurotic and worried.

The rain probably dampened the spirits of those that decided not to come. But the people who were here didn't know it was raining because they were having so much fun.

I mean, in the editing room, you sit there, and you're so happy about a lot of it. You've got these great actors, and the DP's great, and you love it... And then there's so much you're mad about. Cause you've made so many mistakes. So yeah, there're scenarios where you're like, "Ah, I wish I could change this. How do I make this better?" "No matter what I do, the scene's not working, what do I do?"

As corny as it sounds, I'm often pinching myself going, 'What great opportunities and great parts and great people that I've gotten to work with.

Woody Allen, when we did Vicky Cristina Barcelona, said to Rebecca Hall, "Do it one time happy, one time sad, and one time indifferent, as I won't know where you should be until I'm editing this, in terms of your emotions."

If you cry too much on screen, you're crying for the audience.