Actor Quotes

Characters don't belong to anyone, not even the person who plays them.

As an actor, when you encounter a psychopathic personality, you naturally want to make him 'bigger than life,' as the Americans say.

Always when you go to a new country and they teach you bad words, you just say them without knowing the value and people look at you because you didn't know that value of them.

A couple of years after I arrived in Hollywood, everything that was Latino was fashionable, and years after, my thought is that we're not fashionable anymore. We're here to stay.

There are some movies that I would like to forget, for the rest of my life. But even those movies teach me things.

It's a character that I always found really likable. I'm fond of Zorro because he was a popular figure who worked for the people.

If you call a cat, he may not come. Which doesn't happen with dogs. They're different types of animals. Cats are very sexy I think too in the way they move.

I wouldn't want my daughters to date a guy like me. I was dangerous around women in my twenties. I'm terrified that they might end up with someone like me.

I drink a bucket of white tea in the morning. I read about this tea of the Emperor of China, which is supposedly the tea of eternal youth. It's called Silver Needle. It's unbelievably expensive, but I get it on the Web.

I like going everywhere. And I love starting new things.

I did my first movie, 'The Mambo Kings,' in America without speaking the language. I learned the lines phonetically. I had an interpreter actually just to understand directions from my director.

Cats are very independent animals. They're very sexy, if you want. Dogs are different. They're familiar. They're obedient. You call a cat, you go, 'Cat, come here.' He doesn't come to you unless you have something in your hand that he thinks might be food. They're very free animals, and I like that.

I completely take on the risk, the poker game, which being an artist means, and I'm going to try to make a film which honestly reflects what I have in my head.

I mean, the Constitution of this country was written 200 years ago. The house I was living in in Madrid is 350 years old! America is still a project, and you guys are working on it and bringing new things to it every day. That is beautiful to watch.

Expectation is the mother of all frustration.

I have a theory that I really want my kids to know - the only coloration that they make between dad being in films and reality is just a lot of people doing a lot of hard work.

I hate being clean-shaven. My daughter gets very upset if I shave and says, 'Bring back the spikes, Dad.'

I guess I'm a very keen observer, and I'd like to think I have a good imagination.

I get inhabited by a character and then you mourn it. There's a period of mourning for me, definitely.

I fell in love with many women at school who had no idea I existed. I'm a bit of a romantic.

I don't like to come at my character from some really technical place.

I didn't study Greek mythology in school and I wish I had.

I deliberately fly in and out of LA for as small a time as humanly possible.

I always find that 90% of the performance, for me, is about what comes from inside.

Each time you go to the same track you know whether you're improving or whether you're not... it's not open to interpretation. It's measurable - unlike acting.

By the time I finished comedy, I was really burnt out of it. I had had enough. I don't really have a strong desire to prove myself in that area, or to go back to it in any great way.

As an actor I've been attracted to the sort of films that I want to go and see. That tends to usually be drama-related.

A girl's got to be fun. It's the one bit of advice I always give to friends of mine who are thinking of getting married.

Stand-up came out of three things. Frustration, necessity and arrogance. I didn't have a great career ahead of me in anything. Someone literally said to me, 'You should try stand-up,' and took me to a venue.

My chosen exercise is cycling. I just love it.