Jessica Chastain
Acting, for me, has never been about wanting attention or wanting to be seen. It's funny that I'm in a profession where that's where I am. There's so much I want to express; it's about connecting with another person and the intimacy of what that is, and so I have to overcome my shyness.Collection: Funny
Women can be powerful, graceful, and complex, with the ability to make any choice they desire.Collection: Women
I feel like the bigger risks that I take, the more I learn. I know that I learn more from my failures than successes.Collection: Risk
If you don't fully take every moment and love every moment and every person that you're with, your life will be over before you realise.Collection: And Love
It's tough, acting. You have to walk two lines of a tightrope. There's the all-consuming fear of failure: I'm about to fall flat on my face. There's that and there's also confidence - you have to be confident in order to try things - and they fight each other all the time.Collection: Fall
Every time you fail, you learn more.Collection: Failing
I always say I am a realist, and my mom says, "No, you just have anxiety."Collection: Mom
I just want to do what I feel is right in my heart.Collection: Heart
It's okay to be ambitious, it's okay to be over-prepared.Collection: Ambitious
I think both nature and grace live within everyone, and I always strive to be in a world of grace and compassion.Collection: Thinking
The most important thing in my life, and the thing I try to focus on, is to try not to live a life of cruelty. That means trying to make sure I look people in the eye when I meet them. Sometimes you jump in a taxi, or maybe you only have two minutes with someone, and you never see them again. I try to always look them in the eye and have a real experience of what it is to communicate with someone.Collection: Real
No matter what, I'm going to ask for more.Collection: Matter
I want to be involved in a story that makes a difference.Collection: Differences
If someone does something bad to you, you do something worse to them so they never mess with you again.Collection: Doe
I'm the unknown everyone's already sick of.Collection: Sick
We need more points of view from women and we need more support for female directors and writers in the industry.Collection: Views
Put others before yourself, unselfish love, do unto others as you would have done to you.Collection: Unselfish Love
I'm inspired by people who are so sensitive and vulnerable that they try to cover it up.Collection: People
My grandmother used to say, "Sometimes the loudest person in the room doesn't know what they're talking about." Or isn't secure enough in his or her own views to be able to listen to others.Collection: Grandmother
Every time an actress is celebrated for her great work, I cheer. For the more brilliant their performance, the more the audience demands stories about women... And as we all know: a great year for women in film, is just a great year for film.Collection: Cheer
You know, it's recently come into focus for me why I want to be an actor: It's because of the connection I feel to people.Collection: People
I've spent my life being embarrassed.Collection: Embarrassed
To a female superhero her sexiness is not the most important thing about her, it's her mind, her spirit, and when I look at that character that to me is an example of characters that I like to play and I think it does a great thing for women.Collection: Character
I try not to fake anything.Collection: Fake People
I don’t mind if the character is a small character, but I would just like her to have a journey in the film. Sometimes the characters are just there as a prop to further the man’s story. The great directors I’ve talked to, I’ve said listen, I don’t mind playing a woman that is a tiny part, but how does the story affect her? What can I play in the end that’s different from the beginning? Otherwise, it doesn’t make sense, because it’s just like being a prop.Collection: Character
I don't like the idea that fame could mean that people can no longer relate to me.Collection: Mean
I find that the monsters are usually the people that I have the most empathy for because they're the ones that are hurt the most. There's a reason why they're the monsters.Collection: Hurt
An actress friend of mine shared a great trick. She told me to stick my tongue behind my teeth when I smile to keep from over-smiling. If you smile without doing it, sometimes your gums show a little too much. It's an actor's trick!Collection: Teeth
I'm very much a hippie from Northern California.Collection: Hippie
To stand together against homophobic, sexist, misogynistic, anti-Semitic and racist agendas. I’m an optimist and I can’t help but feel hopeful about the future of film - especially looking at all the beautiful people in this room. Martin Luther King Jr. said, ‘Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.’ I would like to encourage everyone in this room to please speak up.Collection: Beautiful
I have problems because I'm very expressive, and usually red lipstick gets on my teeth and face.Collection: Red Lipstick
I am the first one in my family to go to college and I felt a great responsibility when I was at school, because my family was making so many sacrifices for me to be there. I was raised by a single mother, my grandmother got on the plane and helped me move to New York and moved me into the dorm. It was just a big moment, and, yes, it was my dream to be an actress, but also I didn't want to let them down.Collection: Mother
Okay, I'm going to let you in on a little secret: I'm a very superstitious person. I'm walking onto the plane as we speak. I'm putting my hands on the outside of the plane and my feet are on the lip of the plane. I have to do it every time before I fly.Collection: Hands
Women perform great in the box office. Audiences want to see lead female characters.Collection: Character
I've actually been given a great gift. When I walk into an audition with a director, I'm carrying no baggage. They haven't seen me in anything, even though I've done nine films.Collection: Directors
Whatever anyone says, I think the opposite will happen.Collection: Thinking
I don't want to torture anything. It's about trying to live a life where I'm not contributing to the cruelty in the world... While I am on this planet, I want everyone I meet to know that I am grateful they are here.Collection: Grateful
When something happens, I always check myself and know it's going to go away. So be prepared for it. This is a tough business for actors who are sensitive. If you try to hold on to things, you'll go crazy.Collection: Business
There is this immediate connection, this intimacy when you're acting because there's no room to be polite or shy. Also, as an actor I get to connect with women I've never met before.Collection: Acting
I feel very inspired right now because I know there are a lot of people out there who are really scared but I feel this great sense of togetherness and people coming together and saying, "I got your back."Collection: People
Someone doesn't think immediately, "I want to be a lobbyist."Collection: Thinking
Look, if anyone is scared, I got your back.Collection: Looks
I've had to learn how to say 'no' to offers.Collection: Offers
I love being around great actors and film-makers, and I try to hide the fact that I'm in awe of them.Collection: Love Is
I think you have to take the whole idea of wage equality out of the film industry.Collection: Thinking
It's a fact, the majority of films in Hollywood are from the male perspective. And the female characters, very rarely do they get to speak to another female character in a movie, and when they do it's usually about a guy, not anything else. So they're very male-centric, Hollywood films, in general. So I think it's incredible that Ned Benson, when I said I'd love to know where she goes, says okay, I'm going to write another film from the female perspective.Collection: Writing
I'm really lucky because my goal, as an actor, is to disappear into the characters that I'm playing.Collection: Character
I love fall because I love the whole cuddling aspect of it, and a sweater dress has that vibe of I'm going to hunker down and be warm, but it's also very feminine.Collection: Falling In Love
I'm very sensitive in real life. I cannot not cry if someone around me is crying. I will start to cry if someone is crying, even if it's not appropriate. I have that thing in me, a weakness or sensitivity.Collection: Real
For me, I'm not in an industry where I'm starving. I'm so lucky to have this job, I'm compensated for my work in an incredible way. But what I do ask is when I join a production I want to make sure that the male actor isn't making four times my salary, which has been true, or seven times my salary. And if that's true you go, you know what, I don't need this job. It's not really asking for more - it's asking for something that is respectable and equal to the male actor and you have to go, why are women being valued less?Collection: Jobs