A Quote by Martin Landau

Bad actors try to cry, and good actors try not to. Bad actors try to laugh, and good actors try not to.

Martin Landau

Quote Topics

Actors Bad Cry Good Good Actor Good Actors Laugh Try

Quote Author

Martin Landau
American - Actor
June 20, 1928 - July 15, 2017

There are plenty of bad actors and there are plenty of bad directors. There are actors who will always be bad and there are good actors who you cry for because they're being badly directed or the material isn't good enough.

Mike Leigh

The actor has to have some degree of craft, along with the talent. No one tries to laugh except bad actors. No one tries to cry except bad actors. How a character hides his feelings tells us who he is. Most people don't know that, and most actors don't do that. Therefore, there are a lot of actors who put me to sleep, that are considered good actors, but they're predictable and boring. I know how the scene is going to end before it ends.

Martin Landau

A lot of young actors have the idea that, "I've got to do this right. There's a right way to do this." But there's no right or wrong. There's only good and bad. And "bad" usually happens when you're trying too hard to do it right. There's a very broad spectrum of things that can inhibit you. The most important thing for actors - and not just actors, but everybody - is to feel loose enough to create what you want to create, and be free to try anything. To have choices.

Robert De Niro

Playing a drunk doesn't mean being a drunk, only bad actors try to be drunk. A real drunk tries to be sober, he wants another drink. How a character hides their feelings tells us who they are, no one shows their feelings except bad actors.

Martin Landau

I learned early on to abandon all those preconceived notions you have about other actors and it's served me really well. I usually just try to empty my mind of that. I love meeting actors and I love working with actors.

Ryan Reynolds

Every industry, there are rogues and bad actors. There could be rogues and bad actors in journalism. Rogues and bad actors in medicine. Rogues and bad actors in the legal community.

Anthony Scaramucci

You're always going to have ups and downs - if you look at the careers of a whole bunch of people I respect, some of them have good movies, some of them have bad movies. I remember Andrew Garfield said that the only power we really have as actors - or one of the main powers we have as actors - is our choices. We can make interesting choices, but as soon as you've made that choice, so much else is in play: the director, the script can change, the other actors. All you can do is try to make interesting choices and, once you're in it, just do the best you can.

Douglas Booth

I’ve never agreed with the conventional wisdom that ‘actors are great liars.’ If more people understood the acting process, the goals of good actors, the conventional wisdom would be ‘actors are terrible liars,’ because only bad actors lie on the job. The good ones hate fakery and avoid manufactured emotion at all costs. Any script is enough of a lie anyway. (What experience does any actor have with flying a spacecraft? Killing someone?) What’s called for, what actors are hired for, is to bring reality to the arbitrary.

Rob Lowe

One of the good thing about theater in the states, is that the playwright we do have a say, especially in the beginning, when the play is being discussed around the table. We talk about the play, and the actors listen, and there have been cases, you disagree on something... I mean, actors don't usually tell you what they're going to do, they do it. Of course, you try to speak with the director and say, "Is there any way you can bring this actor to do something different?" You try as much as you can, but then, you also have to be open to interpretation.

Nilo Cruz

There are good roles for actors of every age now. In fact TV is a breeding ground for new talents. There are so many actors who start their journey with television, learn so much from here and then start try in films and web.

Rupali Ganguly

Actors, I think, are all the same. Both Korean actors and American actors are all very sensitive people, and they are all curious to know what the director thinks of them and how they are evaluated, and they try to satisfy the director. And they like it if you listen carefully to their opinions and accept them.

Park Chan-wook

A lot of actors try to sabotage other actors, and that's sad because then you're never going to get that beautiful scene.

Erica Durance

I've said before that the common perception that all good actors should be good liars is exactly the opposite; only bad actors lie when they act.

Rob Lowe

There's so many good comic actors that you just take the best of and try and run with it yourself. Try and bring a little bit of yourself to it, too.

Domhnall Gleeson

I think it's important to create an atmosphere where actors feel like they can try things out. It doesn't mean that I'll take every suggestion, but I want there to be some room for actors to grow.