Top 130 Quotes & Sayings by Julia Stiles
Explore popular quotes and sayings by an American actress Julia Stiles.
Last updated on April 14, 2025.
I turn on the radio. I'm a really big fan of old-fashioned dial radio. I love WNYC and NPR and also 88.3 in New York, which is the jazz station, and it's usually good for background music. If I'm not in New York City or by a traditional radio, I'll stream it on my phone, although I usually try not to look at my phone first thing in the morning.
It's actually really great to be a student and an actor, because I get to do this job that I love, then just when I think my head might explode, I get to go to school where they don't really care about what magazine cover I'm on.
I'm going to Columbia University but I'm trying to keep that low-profile because I don't want weird people following me there. I want the experience of normal college life.
I worked regularly from very early on, and some of it was probably a bit premature.
I wear everything from hip-hop baggy pants to beautiful Armani dresses. I also like to mix vintage clothing with designer pieces.
I am a big fan of horror movies but I had never thought that I had wanted to act in one because I don't think that actors get to do much in them. They're usually just reacting.
I was in the video for Cyndi Lauper's 'Sally's Pigeons' when I first started acting.
There are a handful of actors who sustain interest because it's exciting to watch them get better at what they do. I want to be one of those actors.
My parents always stressed finding some sort of creative outlet, so they would take me to dance classes, take me to jazz clubs.
I tend to shut myself off from people. It's gotten harder and harder for me to meet new people. It takes a lot of effort to open up to them and spend time with them.
I love podcasts! I wish I had my own, although I think there are already too many podcasts, so I don't know how I would create a new one.
Even after such milestones as Kathryn Bigelow winning an Oscar, there still seem to be few women in leadership roles.
With film, so much is in the director's hands. Once something is cut together - unless you're in the editing room - you don't really remember what the alternatives are. The exercise in theater is night after night, you are doing the same play, but you have another opportunity to explore.
Dating in college and dating in Hollywood are actually really similar in that the relationships don't last long. Other than that, lots of people in Hollywood tend to be narcissistic, and it's hard to have a relationship with someone like that.
It would probably help my career if I lived in L.A., but I think it would be all-consuming. New York has its own little rat race going on, too. But it's also really diverse and has a lot of people doing different kinds of jobs. In L.A., work would be the only thing I'd think about, and sometimes, I need a break from that.
I feel like I'm constantly trying to avoid awkwardness. I always try to pretend that the awkwardness doesn't exist, and then it just becomes more awkward.
My grandmother took me to a lot of theater. I was exposed to performance quite a bit - everything from Broadway to off-Broadway and dance and music as well. I was very lucky that way. It was a very rich childhood.
I'm terrified at the prospect of Donald Trump becoming president. I think he's disgusting, he's offensive. I think that it would be embarrassing for our country to have him sit down with world leaders and try and have a conference or even take a photo op. So we'll see what happens, but it's a very pivotal time in the U.S.
My mother always taught me to think about things from other people's perspectives and think about where they're coming from.
I like to stay balanced in life, so I don't have to do some radical diet. I love my job, and I obviously want to feel good when I am working, but I also want to feel energized and agile all the time. As a New Yorker, I live in the land of plenty, and yet every day I see people who could use a good meal.
I am ambidextrous. I write with my right hand but played basketball in high school with my left.
I'm slowly working up the courage to sing in front of other people, but I can carry a tune. I do some mean karaoke.
I went to a Chekhov play with my grandmother, and at the end, I was talking about how the first act was so boring. And my grandmother didn't see that at all. I realized it was because I need, like, the constant images changing. I wrote a paper about this.
I think Latin guys are really sexy. They generally fit into that whole tall, dark, and handsome thing.
When I'm working, I need to be pretty disciplined, but I do like to enjoy my food. I like to keep it fresh and wholesome. Preparing your own food can be a great way to unwind.
I like analyzing human behavior. It's complex. That's what keeps me going.
Some of the best projects I've worked on - 'Dexter,' the 'Bourne' series - were leaps of faith. I couldn't read the scripts in advance.
We didn't have a backyard, so as I child, I would turn the coffee table into a stage and put on shows. But it was just a fun thing to do; I never thought about it as a profession. That started as a fluke; my mother had a friend who was an artist with a theater company, and I started going there after school because my mom knew I'd be safe.
Sometimes I think it's easier to play someone who's very, very different from yourself. Besides, I wouldn't want to play people who are just like me; that would get awfully boring very fast!
I love the sun and salt water, which is not good for your skin and therefore not good for your image. I'm terrible about protecting my skin as well.
I always feel like a goofy little kid.
I was gonna throw the first pitch at a Mets game, but there was a rain delay. So I'm waiting for it to stop, and the team's manager, Willie Randolph, comes by. Now he's already intimidating to begin with. But he comes over to me and says, 'If you screw this up, they will boo you.' And I said 'Thanks.'
I directed a short series for Hulu called 'Paloma,' and being in an editing room, I learned a lot about acting. It gave me a new bolt of energy in terms of my interest in filmmaking because it made me realize how collaborative filmmaking can be and also that you're not just limited to one job.
Of course my family and friends are incredibly valuable to me. They keep me sane, they teach me things and I love spending time with them. I think that ranking what you value is a sort of western and linear way of looking at things.
I think audiences, producers and directors included, develop crushes on actors (actresses in particular) and then lose interest and move on to the next one.
I watch comedies most of the time. That's what I gravitate toward. But I think the kinds of roles people see me in are sort of the opposite of that. I'm not really sure why.
We don't have cable, so I don't watch a lot of traditional TV. I watch a lot of Netflix, and there's this thing in Canada called Show Me, and then I also get things from iTunes.
I am not a fan of rats or pigeons. In New York City, they have become very confident. When I was a child, you went on the subways, and the rats would stay down on the tracks, but now they hang out on the platform.
I think the culture of the red carpet is too much like a modern-day coliseum. If you're being photographed all the time, and you don't like having a bad photograph taken, and if you're super, super thin, chances are you're never going to look fat in a picture.
I would give anything to sit down with my maternal grandmother and have a cup of tea and play Scrabble. She died 10 years ago.
I have pessimistic moments when I think I should go on a diet because people are paying money to see movies with exceptional-looking actresses. But being in college has helped me realize that the best thing I can do is to feel good about myself and forget about other people's standards.
One minute, I really am in awe of filmmakers, and I want to be working in film, and then the next minute, I get the itch to get back on stage.
I think with '10 Things I Hate About You,' I was an angsty teenager, and in some ways, I responded to that character. That was one of my first big jobs, so I think maybe I lucked out, and casting thought that I was a good match for it. Since then, as I've gotten older, I'm a much more happy, joyful, almost carefree person.
The true test of a relationship is traveling together.
I think women get caught up too much in having a plan - 'I'm going to get married at this age; I'm going to have a kid at this age' - and then they just try to find a guy who will fit into that picture. I don't want my life to be based on that.
Julia Roberts taught me how to knit on the set of 'Mona Lisa Smile.'
I pretty much grew up in public.
I like a director who is very observant and is watching what I'm doing and noticing what I'm doing but is giving me time to figure it out. They don't jump right in and give you a note before you've had time to really search on your own with how to do a scene. I like a director that encourages me to be playful.
If Beyonce needs another back up dancer, I mean, I could make time.
I met this homeless man who had never owned a shirt in his life. He had taken his pants and worn them as a shirt and I thought it was so creative. He was liberated from the conventions of fashion.
Whatever its origin, I'd like to see a cure for the Incredibly Shrinking Actress phenomena.
I become so sentimental on planes: I could be watching 'Bridesmaids' and start crying.
Sometimes I have these abstract ideas and then lose track of myself.
So I am happy to have fans, especially if it enables me to keep working. And I am really grateful when people respond to my work.
I studied Shakespeare in college, but not theatrically, more in terms of literature, and then I kind of took a break from it. Now there's resurgence in my appreciation for him. It's amazing: there are so many book titles and song titles that come just from lines that he wrote.
I actually have this fantasy of giving up my cell phone.
I'm voting for Hillary Clinton, proudly. I think it's her time. I think she's very experienced, I think she'd make a good president. I also think it would be monumental to have the first female president in the United States.
It would be great to go to school all year and do movies during the summer, but it doesn't work that way. I'm not Julia Roberts, so I have to be flexible.
I think that ultimately I just have to be myself. You know, I don't do anything that outlandish anyway.
It actually makes perfect sense why women in Hollywood get so skinny: because it's a way of controlling how people see you.
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