Adrien Brody
My dad told me, 'It takes fifteen years to be an overnight success', and it took me seventeen and a half years.Collection: Dad
I was a wild, mischievous kid, and I had tremendous imagination. Any experience I had, I'd try to reenact it.Collection: Imagination
All commitments require sacrifice and hardship.
It's interesting, winning an Academy Award as a young man... life-changing, but I'm just me within that. It's been very helpful for my career, but I'm trying to stay on the path I was on before.
It would be terribly boring to be earnest.
I grew up without a lot of money and my parents grew up with far less money. And that's kept me in line. Really in line.
Art can go beyond certain boundaries or blindness that we would have without that.
I grew up around New York, graffiti culture.
Maybe I'm a bit superstitious, but I don't like to talk about anything until I've done it.
You'd be surprised how difficult it is relinquish a cell phone.
Being anonymous is a great luxury. It's a big loss to lose that. Mostly, the loss is the ability to observe others without being observed yourself. And as an actor, that is your key tool.
Luca Changretta's not someone you want to be at odds with. It's a fantastic opportunity for me, and he's a fascinating character.
It's interesting because you feel on the one hand, we understand people from what the say, and in another sense, you'd think that you'd be able to convey more through dialogue.
War is chaotic and when you start having a larger scale film and you have a lot of safety protocols and choreography, I would imagine it becomes more difficult.
I always had an actor within me.
Obviously I'm not there to pick up anybody, but I'm not afraid to hang out in a predominantly gay establishment.
It's great when people appreciate your work, but I don't know how seriously to take it. The amazing thing is that I found something so early that I can support myself doing, and that can even be extremely lucrative, but I love it either way.
What guides me is to do work that's more avant-garde - things that I think are special. You can easily become a celebrity and get caught up in all that blur. I just want to work and surprise myself.
Painting, music, photography, and visual art have been creative forms of expression for me for decades.
I love the accessibility that my great nation affords us, but it is virtually inescapable for most people in America, and many places abroad, to rely on inexpensive yet unhealthy meals as a main source of sustenance.
In my work as an actor, I have been given even greater insights and have been guided towards empathy and a consciousness of those who are less fortunate.
I was depressed for a year after 'The Pianist,' and I don't suffer from that, generally. It wasn't just a depression; it was a mourning.
The only reason to do a television series is to make it successful. And if it is successful, that's a six or seven year commitment.
I grew up in Queens in N.Y., and in parts of my neighbourhood, there were a lot of Italian Americans and a lot of people who were either affiliated with nefarious people or had seen so many movies that they were embodying that.
Life is very complicated. I look to collaborate with artistic people and to go into an endeavor without judgment and to hopefully be treated with the same.
I think there's a lot of catastrophe in this world and a lot of cruelty and a lot of carelessness.
I've been producing projects, and I hope that It's inevitable one day that I direct a film. I have a lot of things I want to do.
The beauty of comedy is you can really push things. Hopefully, you're with people with a sense of humor and can relate to it.
I've been painting and drawing fish since I was very young. My mom found old pictures I did when I was around 6 or 7 of all these sharks and scuba diver looking back, a big ship, throwing a harpoon. There was already a message within what I saw.
My work as an actor is limited by the voice of the director and the writing.
I've been very lucky to work with great filmmakers. But I think my days of just freely acting regularly, that being my sole creative fulfillment, are gone.
Even if you can't afford to buy a painting, you can experience it. You can go see the Mona Lisa and be transported. You can see the discipline and suffering in a van Gogh.
You go to a theater, you're in a darkened room, and you watch someone that you don't really know how many children they have or what their father's nickname might be; you don't have references and databases and rumors and half-truths - you're just transported by their storytelling.
I've been taking a lot of time to paint and be in nature. I would say I'm happier as a person. More centered. More free.
The odd thing is how, I think, the intensity and devotion to my craft and the intensity of certain performances or types of roles I've played overshadow the comedic stints that I've had. 'Darjeeling Limited' is a comedy; The 'Brothers Bloom' is a comedy.
The more I have a sincere connection to something, the less acting is required. And the more it's about creating the space to feel that connection and to feel that shift from yourself. And start interpreting things through new eyes.
Some roles require less, and some roles require a great deal of commitment.
You'd be surprised how difficult it is relinquish a cell phoneCollection: Phones
A little bit of attention and kindness can totally change a whole life, and a lack of that can do the same.Collection: Kindness
It made me have a much greater understanding of loss, of loneliness, and the level of intense tragedy that so many people have experienced in this world, I take a lot less for granted.Collection: Loneliness
I try to pace myself and not work for the sake of working and stick to what inspired me prior to receiving recognition.Collection: Trying
I bet they didn't tell you that was in the gift bag.Collection: Bags
Film is a time capsule. If I have a lack of dedication or focus, it's permanently there as a negative reminder.Collection: Dedication
Part of what attracted me to the village was it had a lot of parallels to contemporary issues. Like, fear and the way fear controls us. How the governing body of a town, or a nation, controls us through fear. They might mean well by it, but we are conditioned to be afraid of things. Fear of the unknown. Fear of terrorism. And it's unfortunate.Collection: Mean
I think you have to be fair with one another. It's unfortunate when someone does something that's not authentic, or not there for any reason other than to draw attention.Collection: Thinking
There are the obstacles of your position as an actor, not being a commodity enough to be hired by the big directors for projects that have some kind of integrity, because the successful actors who've been in the game for a while want those roles. So there's more competition, so you have to work harder and be right for it.Collection: Integrity
Being just yourself means you're unselfconscious in that moment. Or maybe we're all self-conscious to an extent. You meet a pretty girl, you're different from when you meet a tough kid on the street. So perhaps we always are acting, in a sense. But you meet someone you feel you admire or you "know," and it'll be different for that reason. So far, it's an interesting ride, and I'm curious to see what I can find next.Collection: Girl
Depending on what my job requirement is, my techniques change. If something is incredibly difficult to connect to, and painful, then I have to do a lot of work to connect to that and not joke around or lose sight of my job.Collection: Jobs
People think fame and money will bring you happiness. Fame actually makes life, especially human relationships, much more complicated.Collection: Thinking
The normal routine is always the same thing whether it's on a new movie or a new job - there's always a process of getting to know one another. I think part of what makes movies special is that it is a relatively intimate environment and it's pretty short-lived - you get to know one another very quickly.Collection: Jobs