A Quote by Joan Allen

I think of myself more as a character actor than that ingenue leading lady, who started out something like Michelle Pfeiffer, or Jessica Lange. I'm a bit quirkier than that.
The ability to stretch my range into all genres and characters is something I take great pleasure in doing. I thoroughly enjoy it. I consider myself a character actor, though some think of me as a leading man. As an actor, I love shifting gears from character to character, and the more range I can expand, the better.
I think I grew up a bit quickly. I wish I was younger than I am in my head. I feel like an old lady for various reasons. I have a yearning to live out my childhood and teenage years and have a bit more fun than I actually did.
I come from the theater, and I've done a lot of character work in the theater, but Hollywood stuff in film and TV, they've been more leading lady/ingenue type roles.
I'm a character actress. It doesn't mean I can't do leading roles; I don't think of myself as a leading lady.
Jessica Lange is a sweetheart, the nicest lady in the world. She has a Poodle named Jack.
On 'Swingtown,' I think that's when I was able to blend the character-slash-leading lady roles, and that's what I'm doing on 'Once Upon a Time' as well. She's a leading lady, but she's also this character.
I shouldn't say this, but I always love the sidekicks. I want to do a leading-lady role in a film - absolutely. But I find that a lot of times I get attracted to the sidekick role. They stand out a little more because they're quirkier, they're funnier, they're crazier.
I was always the hero with no vices, reciting practically the same lines to the leading lady. The current crop of movie actors are less handicapped than the old ones. They are more human. The leading men of silent films were Adonises and Apollos. Today the hero can even take a poke at the leading lady. In my time a hero who hit the girl just once would have been out.
I think I have that love of colour in common with Eric, my character on 'Sex Education.' That said, his look is often slightly off-kilter - the shoes will be a bit too 'out there,' or the trousers will be leopardprint or something. I like to think I'm a bit more put together than him.
I told my agent which women I aspire to have a career like: Frances McDormand, Kate Winslet, Laura Linney and Emma Thompson - character actresses who have something to say. I also said that I loved Madeline Kahn and Jessica Lange.
I started off as an actor thinking that I would be this Romeo, this dashing leading man. It turns out that I'm a character actor.
I don't really know if I'm writing the kind of roles that Meryl Streep and Julianne Moore would play. Jessica Lange on 'American Horror Story' is a little bit more my cup of tea.
I was always a character actress and never a sex symbol. Even when I was the leading lady, I was a character actor.
When I was first starting out was also when I first started really paying attention to the Oscars and stuff like that. And I remember thinking, 'Wow, everything is great for women in Hollywood, because Meryl Streep, Glenn Close, Jessica Lange, Sally Field - they're all doing incredible work.'
I'm a bit multifaceted in the sense that I've got many more than one musical taste. If you think about it, I started out playing in a punk band and ended up doing electro-pop. That was more an accident than a plan.
I guess I've never really had a great desire to be a leading lady, or be seen as an ingenue.
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