“I know that if I can’t move people, then I have no business being an actor.”

I want to feel sympathetic and close to others, not opposed to them.

Two-thirds of American movies are extensions of commercials — they tell you how to feel and they tell you how to think — rather than letting you figure it out on your own.

My favorite kind of film is serious comedy. Comedy with serious underpinning.

Hollywood is a strange place. The class structure here is more rigid than almost anyplace I’ve ever experienced. It’s made more difficult by the fact that it’s constantly changing.

I gotta keep busy. I’m not happy unless I’m working on two, three things.

It keeps it more of a surprise. I don’t feel like it has to be a mystery.

You know what Andy Warhol’s sole contribution to this country has been? He made Campbell’s Soup a household word.

As hard as it is in your work, it’s harder in your life. But it can be done.

Either you’re growing or you’re decaying; there’s no middle ground. If you’re standing still, you’re decaying.

I had a bunch of lean years where I had to do things, a lot of which I wasn’t wildly enthusiastic about.

I’ve always considered myself an actor, but I wasn’t making a living as an actor.

Ten years ago, it would have been impossible to imagine a Cockney singing group with a Southern Negro style and Indian and electronic music.

All I can say is if the part doesn’t delight me in some way, or I can’t feel any compassion for it, I just can’t do it.

Things are never going to turn out how you think they will.

A product is most easily sold when it has an identity. So they wrap you all up and put a label on you.

Even at that age, six and seven and eight, why I was moved by certain things they did

I think women dress for other women to let them know what their deal is. Because if women were only dressing for men, there would be nothing but Victoria’s Secret. There would be no Dior.

There are two ways to handle a woman, and nobody knows either of them.

I don’t care anything about reasons, but I know what I like.

I didn’t know how we were going to get jobs out of NAFTA, but I tend to be suspicious of these things, like NAFTAs and WTOs and so on.

I’m not going to jump out of airplanes or anything like someone else I know.

The relation between what we see and what we know is never settled. Each evening we see the sun set.

I’m sure that I don’t know everything I want to know. I have so much more to learn.

A lot of what we experience as strength comes from knowing what to do with weakness. Nickel and Dimed On (Not) Getting By in America