Top 138 Quotes & Sayings by John C. Reilly
Explore popular quotes and sayings by an American actor John C. Reilly.
Last updated on December 24, 2024.
I know I'm not some matinee idol, but I think we're sold this bill of goods by the media, which says that only the most beautiful and dashing people can become movie stars. So when someone like me sneaks in, they have to redo the calculations.
One of the unique things is that whether we were out at sea or in the middle of the water tank, a lot of times you just couldn't leave. Especially when we were out at sea.
I did a movie with Leonardo DiCaprio, and his skill level was eons ahead of mine. It was really more like an abattoir - he just slaughtered my character over and over again.
It's thought of as an eccentric thing for an actor to really try to maintain quality control through the whole career. Most people think, 'You just work. You just keep working.' And in some ways I wish I could be a guy who's just a workhorse.
A lot of times, good improv is when both people, or however many people are in the scene, really have no idea what the next thing you're going to say is.
Animation is a great way to work. No early morning call times, no make-up chair. In live action, you're always fighting the clock; the sun is always going down too soon.
My family are all storytellers, and I think I inherited a lot more of that gene than other people in my family. I guess I was fun to have around.
I grew up listening to a lot of player-piano music in my house and a lot of old Tin Pan Alley songs and American standards. My dad listened to a lot of traditional Irish music and I grew up doing musical theater. So most of the music I was exposed to as a kid was pre-rock n' roll.
You know, the truth is that us actors would all like to believe we re-invent the wheel, every time we play a character. But, we're human beings and our instruments are not violins, they are our bodies and our consciousness and our collective life experience.
I'm dating myself by saying this, but I was the test audience for 'Space Invaders.' I remember when that was the first game that wasn't a pinball game. I spent a lot of money on 'Space Invaders,' in the form of quarters, of course.
I was a solid C student because I was doing so many plays. I was a drama nerd, but I was also kind of a Zelig-like character; I would shift between different groups of people. But the people I spent most of my time with were either chorus or swing choir or the drama nerds.
Hollywood is an illusion. These intense workplaces, with very close relationships, a few months at a time - and then it ends.
Young people can be annoying, let's face it. But they can also be really refreshing to be around and full of enthusiasm.
Actually, acting turned out to be the perfect job for me, because I had a lot of different interests. I thought about being a priest at one point. I thought about being a teacher. I thought about being a lawyer. But I think acting is probably the best job for me.
Here's the thing, with comedy - and I learned this from Will Ferrell - you can't be ashamed. If you're doing comedy, you have to fully commit to the joke. Shame is not part of it. If you act shy or uncomfortable about your body, that makes the audience shy and uncomfortable. And in a comedy you just want them to loosen up and laugh.
I would consider directing. I think directing myself would be tough, but I'm definitely interested in directing. I might start off directing a play before I move to a film.
Why people pick me for the roles that they do is a bit of a mystery.
A script is like a theory of a movie.
In Chicago it's really a case of the play's the thing - people are just so happy to be acting, you know? We were all actors - not like in New York or Los Angeles, where everyone says they are actors but they are actually waiting tables and hustling for spots in commercials.
There is a level of fame that is really unmanageable. But most of the people who experience that level of fame are compensated in other ways. Private villas and chauffeured boats.
I'm not a big fan of kids' movies that have this knowing snarkiness to them or this post-modern take on storytelling. I think that sails right over the heads of most kids. There's something to be said for a well-told fairy tale. There's a reason that these mythic stories stay with us.
I listen to a lot of Chicago blues, I suppose. It reminds me of growing up, I guess. But I'm also obsessed by close-harmony groups. Actually, I'm fascinated particularly by brother duos, how they blend together. The Everly Brothers, the Stanley Brothers, The McQuarrys. There's something inherently magical about harmony.
Whatever the reasons that I turn things down, I'm always happy when there's a good result, and I can enjoy it as a movie, you know? I don't feel like, 'Oh man, that was really good. I should have done it.' You have to make the decisions you have to make, whether it has to do with your family or repeating a character or whatever it is.
I was never a very dependable employee for anything. Perfect for the actor's life!
I love card games, and I've always loved board games and stuff like that as a kid, and I think it's that part of your brain that's engaged in con movies. It's like this 'Who's outsmarting whom?'
I give as much as I can, and it's up to someone else to turn it into a movie. Good luck to you!
People say, 'Don't you get tired of people coming up to you all the time?' But what's wrong with strangers saying they love you?
I view my strongest competition as myself. You're always trying to top yourself, rather than worrying about what other people are doing.
Most boys' first hero is their father. That was definitely true of my dad. He was a proud Irish American and he taught me a lot about ethics and responsibility. He also introduced me to a lot of wonderful folk music.
Acting's all about the confidence you exude, especially on film. I mean, nervousness isn't attractive in anyone, but a film camera will seek it out and punish you.
Being unprepared makes me nervous. I'm old-fashioned show folk.
You were there all day long, 12 hours a day. So there was none of this, 'I'm going back to my trailer, my trailer's bigger than your trailer,' that kind of Hollywood nonsense.
Whenever I work on something, I try and throw everything I have at it. Then if the director finds it useful they use it, and if not, they ignore it!
This is real human drama, we're not creating some amusement park ride for the summer. Even though the movie is really exciting to watch, it's got a real pathos behind it.
God forbid you got seasick because there was no option to go back. So that really did force us to be a group.
I feel like a teenager myself, so I appreciate it when the kids think you're all right.
I'm not of the manor born; I've never felt entitled in that way. I just came to Hollywood to be an actor. All that lifestyle stuff is something to be managed.
To me, it doesn't make any sense to pick your work based on the size of the budget of the movie.
I like working. I wish I could say I made a deliberate choice to comedy, but it's just what came my way. It's what the studios wanted to make. Some of my friends were doing it, like Will Ferrell and Adam McKay, and they offered me 'Talladega Nights.' It's just nice work if you can get it. It's a joyful day at work, making your friends laugh.
I went to an all-boys Catholic school, and not only were we not allowed to wear pajamas, we had to wear dress shirts, dress pants, a tie, dress shoes... they stopped making us wear blazers, like, two years before I started there, so pajamas... you wouldn't even get in the front door wearing pajamas at my school.
From the first time I did a movie, people have said, 'Oh, it's all going to change now.' And it would change, but very incrementally. I think I prefer that to some big explosion of fame all of the sudden.
It's true that the skills required to be a conman are the same as those required for being an actor. Though those skills are in the service of something a bit more noble with acting, I hope.
This whole celebrity racket, it's not really my bag. I don't really do that stuff, and I am not looking to get famous myself. I would love it if my characters get famous, my work was well known and appreciated. But I'm an actor, not a spokes model or a celebrity or whatever that is. I don't know how to be that.
There's something about the water - that solitary kind of peaceful feeling. You're on Earth but not quite.
I always felt really guilty if I spent too much time playing video games. It's a colossal waste of time. And I can't say it's a very satisfying feeling at the end of the day, if you've spent eight hours playing a video game; you just end up feeling kind of spent, and used.
I swear and it comes off a little angry, no matter how funny I'm trying to do it. If I use certain words with a certain intensity, it's like 'Whoa whoa whoa, buddy buddy!'
Despite not looking like a matinee idol, I feel like I have a lot to give. I've never had any trouble with women. People are always surprised with the romantic aspect of my movies.
An actor's life is like a series of - it's like the first day of school happening over and over again.
If people want to see me in comedies, that's fine with me.
Kind of the exhausting thing about doing pure comedy, or something that's broader, is you're kind of a slave to the laugh. If it's not funny, then there's not much point in doing it. The kind of ueber-objective is to make people laugh. You always have to have that in the back of your mind, 'Eh, I've got to figure out a way to make this funny.'
I am one of those people who is not very patient in the makeup chair. I have been offered movies like 'Planet of the Apes' and stuff like 'The Grinch Who Stole Christmas' and I turned them down.
When they're good, I like working with new actors.
One of the reasons people find me a believable actor is that I don't seem like one of the gods from Olympus. I seem like someone who was lucky enough to be let into Olympus.
Oh, absolutely, it felt more serious than your typical job. One of the things that got us through how difficult the shooting actually was was that we are telling a real story.
I would love to do a western. I would love to play an explorer. That is always something that has really captured my imagination since I was a kid, like James Cook or Magellan or Earnest Shackleton.
Being a father has fulfilled me in parts of my life that sustain me. It gives me a comfort and patience. All actors have this hole inside that they're trying to fill by performing. I'm anxious to keep creating, but I'm not so desperate any more because I have the love and support of my kids and wife.
I don't deliberately go into comedy or go into indies, but I do deliberately try to keep changing tact, because I think that is the key to longevity in a career.
I just like surprising people. I never want to get to a place where people see that I am in a movie and they go see the movie and they expect a certain performance one way or the other. That is just inherently boring to me.
I try to take things that challenge me either physically or mentally, or I have to learn a new skill.
I don't know how to be like a Bill Murray or a Will Ferrell, these guys who know how to make a line funny just by, I don't know, some extra-sense perception. I only know character and emotion and real acting; that's all I know how to do.
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