Top 122 Quotes & Sayings by Jimmy Smits - Page 2

I think education was the key for me, and that's what I tell kids. That base in the classics gave me something to springboard from, which I wouldn't have had if I'd come out to Los Angeles early and been guest punk of the week on 'Hill Street Blues.'

My life hasn't changed that much. Sure, people recognize me, and airports can get tough, but the people who stop me tend to be real nice.

When you're doing 22 shows on network television, the writers are going on vapors towards the end and, as an actor, you're just trashed by the end.

I don't feel I have to acknowledge how I'm doing by an award.

I know it affected me when I saw certain actors growing up. I had a drama teacher that would take us to see plays in New York, and it was seeing James Earl Jones and Raul Julia - I mean, this guy comes from the place my mother comes from. He's doing Shakespeare right now, and it doesn't seem to matter that he has an accent.

Every actor has to deal with what's on his plate, and I try to deal with doing the best work possible with the most challenging scripts. I don't base it on whether it's a feature film or a TV-movie or cable.

It's a lot of a workload doing an hour dramatic show. It's just incredible what little time off you get.

California has been very good to me in terms of the professional arena.

Doing a truncated series is like doing a long movie, which allows for a certain artistic freedom. After just 12 episodes, you can take a breather and do other things for your career.

I've had the good fortune to play characters that have a role-model thing to them.

I have been in rooms with people arguing over a character that's not really fleshed out: that, just because the surname is Latino, that automatically means you have an accent.

That 'who's the sexiest' business is a crock that the media cooked up to sell magazines, so while I say thank you very much, I don't put much stock in it.

Growing up in New York, we lived all around the city depending on our economic circumstance. I also lived in Puerto Rico for a number of years.

All my Latino side is from the Bronx.

What happens to George Clooney and Bruce Willis is great, but I can't gauge my career by anyone else's.

What we need to focus on is not that we're not nominated, but that we have many more Latinos that are in prominent positions on shows all across the dial than ever before.

At first, I took theater courses on the side. Then, theater became my minor; then it was my major.

I'm usually very analytical when I'm prepping stuff: real into the head thing.

I wasn't a great student, but I was interested in this theater thing, and I could spend hours in the library researching why the cuffs in the 18th century had four buttons. It was my handle.

Latino people have come up to me and said they were motivated to become a lawyer because they saw me play one on TV - and you can't discount how great it is when they tell me I was the first.

As an actor, it's hard to approach any character with negatives.

I can't get into talking about why another actor left. It has nothing to do with me.

I've been told that I wasn't Latino enough, which was code for 'street' enough.

I have carried the burden of being a role model for some time. And that's great. The body of work I've done has afforded me that opportunity.

My comfort zone has always been in an ensemble-type atmosphere.

I don't want to have the bounds put on me in terms of mediums.

When you're 27 million strong, no one can tell you that you don't belong or expect you to just move along.

I am very Latino in everything I am and I do, but there's a part of me that's also something else. I'm reflective of the way this country's gonna be in the next 40 years. More multicultural is what we'll see.

We tend to think of World War II and all the atrocities that happened, and people say, 'Never again.' But these things are still happening. The Amnesty International files are big.

There just aren't enough positive portrayals of Latino life in film.

I always grapple with myself, from job to job, 'Is this going to make an impact in some way?'

The great thing about working in cable is that, since the season is truncated - we only do 12 shows - the writers are more at ease in terms of mapping out the trajectory of the story and the characters.

My central strength as an actor is the fact that I'm 6 foot 3. A certain power emanates from my size, juxtaposed with the fact that I try to find an element of sensitivity in every character I play. People enjoy seeing that because it goes against what we're led to expect as far as the way men are supposed to be - macho and all that.

I'm not going to leave one of the best shows to do another TV show.

I do want to be involved in quality projects that say something positive about the Latino community.

Nurturing a project from the ground floor is something I've been wanting to do.

As an actor, you think to yourself, 'I want to do good work,' but you also want the work that you do to make an impact in some way.

I've been lucky because I've had wonderful teachers along the way who have nurtured and pushed me to the next level.

I was asked to speak at a bar association, because there's an upswing on college applications - in general and for Latinos - because of 'L.A. Law.' I went to a couple of functions, and I just felt an energy: It was, you're doing a good job, but do you realize how important it is?

I left 'L.A. Law' after five years when my contract was up because I felt I had done all I could do with the character. I didn't walk off the show with a three-picture deal to pursue this wonderful film career.

There's show business, and the business is sometimes in capital letters. You just have to give it your best shot when up at bat.

For me, the bottom line is what's on the page.

What's on the page dictates a lot of what I do. When the words are there, it's easy.

With the advent of cable and such, you guys are calling it the golden age of TV in terms of the writing and stuff. But it's like different branches of a big tree that TV has become.

I'm happy David Caruso is out there working.

I don't know... I don't think you can trust any of Kurt's characters. That's how Mr. Sutter operates: nothing is what it seems.

I get my jolt of energy in New York. I get mi familia vibe in New York.

When I grew up, we went to Coney Island and Central Park. We'd find our way to the water and watch the fireworks.

I'm happy that just about on every other show there's a Latino somewhere present, and we're not all the cooks anymore.

There's a lot of successful procedural shows that are out there. A lot of them are very successful. I just know there's an audience out there that wants character also.

People become actors because they want to hide, and it's not easy to talk about myself. I accept that a certain responsibility goes with being an actor in the public eye, but I haven't found a comfortable way to deal with it.

An actor tries to be versatile, to immerse himself in a different culture.

Variety is the thing for me to be able to work in theater and be involved in more films and TV movies that say something.

People don't walk around thinking of themselves as bad people. You're part of the environment that you grow up in, and there can be decency in that. I always try to find a little glimmer of that, in anything that I do, because you can find places where there's humor or lightness in something that's deep and profound, and that tends to resonate more and make people more human. As an actor and performer, I think it resonates more with the audience when you do have the payoff.

Just give me a good role that allows me to hone my craft and I am a pretty happy camper.

What struck me more than anything is how the people that are involved in government start out from a place of really wanting to do well, no matter what kind of political spectrum they're on, how they have to hold onto that warm fuzzy place in their heart while they're stuck in the machine.

It's great to be able to play the bad guy role because you always get a lot to do, but I'm always looking at the why. How does a person get to that particular point? It's those little cogs in the wheel that make it interesting for me to play. Ultimately, I hope for the audience to be engaged with it because it is going to take a turn.

You have to be like a sponge and use what you can and how it relates because TV is fluid. Things change on a week-to-week basis. Those are the things that I do with every character. If I'm involved in a boxing movie, I go see fights and learn about boxing. It's part of what we do.

I am a firm believer in education and have worked very hard to tell young Latinos that they must go to college and that, if possible, they should pursue an advanced degree... I am convinced that education is the great equalizer.

Celebrity hits like a bomb. So you have to find what makes you stable in the storm. Then, no matter what's happening around you, no matter what the hype or the publicity, you can still manage to make leaps in your work as an artist.