Willem Dafoe
I do know that I like to play characters that are sometimes a little on the outside - that's because it feels kind of romantic and sexier to me. I really think they are the people that we learn lessons from.Collection: Romantic
I think on some level, you do your best things when you're a little off-balance, a little scared. You've got to work from mystery, from wonder, from not knowing.Collection: Work
The mask can be a limitation, but you just deal with it. You do get superhuman strength and pumpkin bombs and all this other stuff to express yourself with.'Collection: Strength
Great theatre is about challenging how we think and encouraging us to fantasize about a world we aspire to.Collection: Great
I was born William. My father was William. I came from a big family, I hated being called Billy. Willem's a nickname; it's a Dutch name, very common in the Netherlands.Collection: Family
There's a real wisdom to not saying a thing.Collection: Wisdom
I love doing action and stuff; the problem is usually action movies are not that interesting. Also as I get older I feel like there's less opportunities for me.
That's a frustration sometimes, that certain directors that I'd like to work with, they just aren't doing stories that I'm sort of castable in. Not always, but sometimes I have that frustration.
Corruption is something you face all the time. Avoid it.
In order to inhabit a character, you've got to embrace and empathise with them.
I knew very little about 'Spider-Man'. I grew up more in the 'Superman' generation. 'Spider-Man' - I didn't know so much. But it is a really successful franchise, and I'm happy to be involved with it.
I think back story can help guide your choices, but when you're playing a scene, you're not making choices; you're just intuitive.
You have to lose yourself to find yourself.
Weirdness is not my game. I'm just a square boy from Wisconsin.
I don't have a preference between theatre and film; I like to do both. But I will say that there's something about theatre that is more nourishing and sustaining than film ever can be.
I'm a task-oriented actor. A pretender. And I try to invent my process anew each time I make a new project. So I frown on any method.
A lot of critics are lazy. They don't want to look closely and analyze something for what it is. They take a quick first impression and then rush to compare it to something they've seen before.
The worst thing is to get involved with people who aren't passionate about what they're doing.
When I give over to somebody's vision rather than have an idea of what I need to do, it takes me to places I wouldn't have got to by myself. I'm always attracted to a strong director.
Turn off the sound in a movie, and if you can tell what's going on, the movie should work.
I don't think people want to see me as a regular guy; besides, I'm a regular guy in real life. I guess I just want to be reckless in my work.
Action breeds inspiration more than inspiration breeds action.
My dad was a surgeon, my mom a nurse, and they were always out working. I had five sisters and a brother. They didn't care what I got up to.
I'm an optimist. I hope if a movie's good that it will be a success, but as we know, that's not always true, just because of popular taste, advertising, distribution patterns - there's lots of reasons.
Celebrity is okay as long as you know it's not about you.
Film is an editor's medium. You can create very good raw material and they can make it horrible, or you can do not so well and they can make it beautiful. You don't really know.
I set myself challenges every time I work. Ideally, I approach everything as though it's the first time - with a beginner's mind and an amateur's love.
I am confident only when I am constantly in motion. Between projects, the doubt creeps in.
I have no doubt that if I met Bob Dylan, it would be disappointing - and annoying to him. But that's why I like Bob Dylan.
I'm no different to anyone else; I want people to like me. I just don't particularly want them to understand me.
With theatre, you have to be ready for anything.
One of the pleasures of being an actor is quite simply taking a walk in someone else's shoes. And when I look at the roles I've played, I'm kind of amazed at all the wonderful adventures I've had and the different things I've learned.
The best thing an actor can be is ready. Be flexible, be ready.
I wish to Christ I could make up a really great lie. Sometimes, after an interview, I say to myself, 'Man, you were so honest - can't you have some fun? Can't you do some really down and dirty lying?' But the puritan in me thinks that if I tell a lie, I'll be punished.
I try to do as many of my own stunts as possible. If you keep on taking yourself out of the role you play, you lose the thread of the character.
I think, as I've gotten older, I've been able to be more reckless with my choices, because practically speaking, you get less careful. Your choices become more instinctive, and you feel like if you make a mistake, it won't destroy you.
I'll never be able to really see a film that I'm in.
I'm one of those people who when I go over a bridge, I want to jump. It's just this intense tickle in the back of my throat. It's like I'm on the verge the whole time I'm walking over that bridge, and I'm not going to get a release until I jump.
Film is fragmented and gets into lots of other people's hands. There are a lot of pleasures that theatre gives me. You get to perform uninterrupted.
Any actor who tells you that he makes choices, absolutely, is wrong. You find work and work finds you.
All the time, as an actor, you want to be asking what's next and where things are going. If you're not asking those questions, you're not growing.
Let's hope I never end up on a deserted island, because I could never make a decision on which three CDs to take with me.
The Midwest isn't somewhere you mix with those from the performing arts. But my mum and dad would go off to Chicago every so often to see shows. They would bring back the albums and the movies, those little eight metres, and we would all watch. I think that was when I fell in love with acting.
I do want to be in mainstream movies that are going to be seen. I suppose it satisfies the showbiz side of me.
When I was a kid I was very interested in the idea of the will, finding out what you're capable of. I liked those kind of challenges.
In films you do a scene, you play around with it and unless you're doing a lot of reshooting, which no one has the luxury to do, you deal with the problem for a day and then you move on. On some level, it never allows you to go very deep into what performing is about.
The bad things about theatre get balanced by the good things in film and vice versa. So to tell you the truth, I love it when I can go back and forth - it feeds different parts of you and exercises different muscles.
It's true in the beginning I started playing villains, and I think that's pretty clear, because if you don't conventionally look a certain way and you've got a certain kind of presence when you're young, then what's available to you is character roles, and the best character roles when you're young tend to be villains.
I was watching 'Wild at Heart,' and I can honestly say I did nothing for that apart from show up!
Plenty of bad movies are very successful, and plenty of good movies are not. And distribution is so crazy, some films won't even get their day in court.