I thought I'd have time to become a movie star. And it didn't happen, did it? We're still waiting. And they're saying, 'Don't hold your breath, kid.' Even movie stars can't get movies, you know what I mean?
You put a movie star or a bunch of movie stars in a movie, it doesn't mean people are gonna go see it. It's been proven time and time again.
If I thought of myself as a movie star, I'd be an idiot. I don't know anyone who thinks like that. I don't even know movie stars who think like that.
When I started on 'The West Wing,' that was at a time when this was still a stigma, because movie stars didn't do TV. Now, every movie star is desperate to find their 'True Detective.'
When I was a little kid, I wanted to be, like, you know, a movie star, you know? Or, I always have interest in movie, you know? Because I like the visual aspect of the movies, et cetera.
At the Golden Globes, they put all the bigger stars in the front; the movie stars in the front, TV actors in the back. But even as a movie star, you can be outseated by a bigger star in any given year. It's kind of hilarious. You have to take it in stride.
Occasionally I do movies with other directors. I did 'The Diving Bell and the Butterfly' for Julian Schnabel. I did a movie with Jim Brooks ('How Do You Know'). I did a movie with Judd Apatow ('Funny People'). So I do get a chance to work with other people, which is always enjoyable, always pleasant. But still, Steven [Spielberg] makes the types of movies that I'm interested in as well.
Our memory and the movies keep movie stars alive for us, and Tony Curtis is still a star.
You can be mediocre, the way most actors are, and you can still be a top movie star, even if your movies are boring and predictable. All you have to do is know how to sell yourself, let yourself be manufactured.
I'm not really a movie star. No matter what I do in acting, whether I'm good, how much work I get, whatever, I never will be a movie star. Because I never think of myself as one. You are a movie star because you think of yourself as a movie star and always have.
I did a few movies, but the word 'star'... I cannot compare to a star like Clint Eastwood. I used to call Clint 'Larry Dickman' when he would come to my show; then, he started using the name when he would go under cover in a 'Dirty Harry' movie. That's why he's a movie star... he's so creative.
We're all so jaded. We've seen so many movies. We know what's going to happen in every single movie. I mean, there are some movies where I'm like why do I even need to keep watching? And so, if you can make a movie in which you're completely surprising the audience left and right, and left and right, then you've won. If a jaded film critic or reporter or an audience is like, "I didn't see that one coming," that to me is like a victory.
Sometimes it takes time to become part of the collective unconscious, just like 'Fanboys' did. Going into that movie, I said to myself that if you were a 'Star Wars' fan, you were going to love that movie. It's an homage to everything science-fiction, but especially 'Star Wars.'
I always at home as a kid tried to move something with your hand and it doesn't move and then you get to do it in a movie. I mean my superpower is quickness but you know what I'm saying. You get a superpower and you're like "Man this is awesome. I get to pretend I have a superpower."
I never considered myself a movie star, and I didn't want to become a movie star, because as soon as you do, you throw away that possibility of playing character. You really do. All of a sudden you're just an entity, you know?
When I'm doing a movie, I'm not doing anything else. It's all about the movie. I don't have a wife. I don't have a kid. Nothing can get in my way... I've made a choice, so far, to go on this road alone. Because this is my time. This is my time to make movies.
Sometimes one of my ways of choosing movies that I want to do is if it's the kind of movie I would have gone to see when I was a kid, and this is a movie I actually did go see, as a kid. And I think it will be exciting for audiences to see now.