Marian Seldes
I try to find humor in everything I do, because I think all great plays - even great tragedies - have enormous humor in them.Collection: Humor
If I had a religious belief, I would want it to be as strong as my belief in the theater.
Unfortunately, there are mental invalids of every age who exist on other people's terms. It's lazy for older persons to let others make up their minds for them. People have to overcome that.
All I've done is live my life in the theater and loved it.
I'm fairly obedient. I do what I'm told.
I've never been obsessed by how I looked. In fact, I would rather have looked more ordinary so I could play more parts more truthfully.
If you're unhappy in a relationship, I think you just don't trust yourself for getting into another one.
I would hate to think of the theatre world without critics. Without them, we'd not have the record of each season.
An actress spends a lifetime observing people. You build up a mental library. No, not a library. Make that a repository.
I think of myself as only being an actress when I'm acting, but my friends will say I act all the time.
I think the first time I was ever really conscious of the difference between people's voices was that my mother's voice was so soft and gentle and her pronunciation was so perfect.
When I began to act, I was about 6 years old. Everything you learned, every period of history you studied, you did a play about it.
I grew up in a house where language was appreciated and cared about. I'm sure that, although I wasn't aware of it at the time, it must have made an impression on me.
How do people who live utterly alone survive? There are so many things that won't open. I've got a few dresses in New York, and I can somehow get them on, but I can't get them off.
People say, 'How can you stay in a play for a long time?' I say, 'The audience is never the same.'
I know I'm funny, because I'm eccentric, I'm odd. I'm not what you expect.
The kind of acting I love is when you watch and you discover what you think perhaps you weren't supposed to see: the chink in the armor.
I love being with someone, taking care of someone.
I almost never go to the theatre without seeing someone I've taught or known at Juilliard.
Theatre is where I am confident and happy.
I'm not a good tourist. I don't like walking around and looking at things. I like being in a city and working and finding out how other people live.
There's no trick of teaching acting. Either someone wants to do it and is gifted, or not.
Confidence has nothing to do with what you look like. If you obsess over that, you'll end up being disappointed in yourself all the time. Instead, high self-esteem comes from how you feel in any moment. So walk into a room acting like you're in charge, and spend your energy on making the people around you happy.
I've been, for want of a better phrase, a supporting actress so much of my life.
I have had a career in which, almost without exception, every single person I've worked with has helped me.
Acting takes so much energy.
I always think of myself as an 18-year-old beginning my career, all the time.
Own the room. Confidence has nothing to do with what you look like. If you obsess over that, you'll end up being disappointed in yourself all the time. Instead, high self-esteem comes from how you feel in any moment. So walk into a room acting like you're in charge, and spend your energy on making the people around you happy. Giving confidence to others will come back to you and you'll end up feeling better about yourself.Collection: Inspirational
My grandmother always used to say, "If you know your past and you know where you have to go, why do you rehearse?" I always remember this and it's true. You have to start each day again-you can't repeat what you did.Collection: Grandmother
I had never heard anyone play like Benny Goodman and had never seen anyone like him on the stage. I realize now that what impressed me and stayed with me in memory was - the sounds he made. He played so purely. The music seemed to come from him, not just the instrument he played with such mastery.Collection: Memories
I have had a career in which, almost without exception, every single person Ive worked with has helped me.Collection: Careers
In Milly Barranger, Margaret Webster has found the perfect biographer. In Margaret Webster, Milly Barranger has found her perfect subject. She brings to vivid life a fascinating and important theater figure whose public and private lives were of equal interest. In this carefully researched book, Webster's colleagues, lovers, and friends shine as brightly as she did. I wish she were here to read it.Collection: Book