A Quote by Willem Dafoe

I try to attach myself to people who really inspire me, and directors who are really passionate. That way, I can give myself more fully and trust the impulse behind why the film is being made, and I can be a little more irresponsible in finding out what the character is.
If you know what it is before you even start, it's not as interesting. Central to being an actor is pretending, and the adventure of it all. That's why you become a junkie for different kinds of situations. I try to attach myself to people who really inspire me, and directors who are really passionate. That way, I can give myself more fully and trust the impulse behind why the film is being made, and I can be a little more irresponsible in finding out what the character is. I have to worry less about what the character means if I trust the director.
I'm really passionate about things I enjoy, and I like to be out there doing things, and learning and challenging myself. So it's just more fun that way, just to get out and try and do and learn and meet people and try to do something new.
When my mind is clear, I feel like I can give more of myself to those around me and hopefully bring light and joy and an infectious kind of energy to inspire them to do whatever they want to do. That's really the key behind it all.
Soap operas are like boot camps for film actors, so I really learned a lot. It was a masterclass in working for camera. I made myself watch myself every day. I would sort of try and be objective about it and critique myself a little. There's a lot more skill set than people realize in soap operas. They shoot, like, 35 scenes a day.
I'm really lucky because I surround myself onset with people who I really trust to give me feedback, so I'm directing myself.
What I try to do is write from the inside out. I really try to jump into the world of the film and the characters, try to imagine myself in that world rather than imagining it as a film I'm watching onscreen. Sometimes, that means I'm discovering things the way the audience will, with character and story.
To have to watch myself in a way that was constructively critical was really good for me because it made me a little bit more easy on myself because I wasn't allowed to walk away screaming.
I never really thought about myself being in really big movies at all. In fact, I always though I'd do, I don't know, smaller movies is not quite the right word, but more character-oriented, dramatic things. I took myself a little bit seriously.
I wouldn't call myself a commitment-phobe, but someone who really likes to try everything to the point of wanting to do short-term projects, just to give myself the opportunity to go to more places and try more things.
The older I get, the one thing I can trust in myself more than anything else is the way I feel about something. When I photograph I try to be as aware of my feelings as I can be to somehow try and get them out of me and onto the film in terms of the way I am responding or seeing the world.
My hair was so much a part of my personality and all my photo shoots. I hid behind my hair. And then, I just decided I was okay with myself. To have short hair and really show my face is even more revealing than anything. It's a statement - not to everyone else, more to myself. I'm just ready to get out from behind my hair and be myself.
I try to pride myself on being involved with the fans and taking pictures when they're asked for because I know I was that little kid one day that really looked up to stars like myself, and I try to give them that on my behalf.
I feel like I have a job to do, like I constantly have to reinvent myself. The more I up the ante for myself, the better it is in the long run. I try to interact with my fans as much as possible. It's good that the person I'm being onstage isn't really an act. It's really me.
I really comprehend the fact that some of what I have to say sounds a little weird. But the more and more I purge myself of the stuff that had my focus so turned away from God, the more I shred myself, the more I have a greater connection to God. And what I know now that I didn't know then is that's why I'm here.
People ask, 'Why would you cast yourself in your movie?' And, for me, it's more like an achievement that I am now not playing all the parts, you know? Like I was for so long, in all my performances and a lot of my short movies. So, that's where I'm coming from, not out of a kind of actress-y sense of myself. I mean, I don't really see myself as an actress, but more from performance: this is how you make something. You do it yourself. You're in it and you write it. I think I keep doing it that way, 'cause it's my way. It's what makes me feel like I know how to do it.
I'm finding things out about myself as a person - as a writer - as I write, and so are the people who listen to what I do. But they have this additional aspect of how they take the stuff that I do, and so it broadens the work and it creates this strange connection. It's really a way of strangers communicating through this third thing, which is a body of work. But really, I know it's a cliché to say I write for myself, but I write for myself.
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