Willem Dafoe Quotes

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.

Emotionally men and women are different, but only as a result of the physical differences. It all comes back to our bodies.

Weirdness is not my game. I’m just a square boy from Wisconsin.

Basically, when I hear the words ‘family drama,’ I run in the opposite direction.

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.

Truth is, generally I like film festivals; somewhere at some level there’s an exchange of ideas.

There’s a real wisdom to not saying a thing.

In my experience, sometimes a movie just hits at the wrong time, gets the wrong press, or gets the wrong representation, and it gets misunderstood.

I’ll never be able to really see a film that I’m in.

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.

In order to inhabit a character, you’ve got to embrace and empathise with them.

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 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 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.

You have to lose yourself to find yourself.

Performing is about developing empathy, which leads us to a broader view of the world and encourages us to develop compassion; so we can comfort each other and not be so brutal with each other.

The best thing an actor can be is ready. Be flexible, be ready.

The director’s very important to me, particularly when the director has a recognizable style.

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.

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.’

I do want to be in mainstream movies that are going to be seen. I suppose it satisfies the showbiz side of me.

The English Patient’ is about the coming together of a French-Canadian nurse, an English patient, a Sikh in a turban and me, Caravaggio, and each of us is seeking a resolution to our own problems.

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.

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.

I was watching ‘Wild at Heart,’ and I can honestly say I did nothing for that apart from show up!

When you have something to work with, then you fly with it.

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 guess they often cast me as the bad guy, because I’m not, er, conventional looking. I look sort of violent. I’m the odd one out, the outsider.

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.

I love Sam Neill. The thing that I always say about him, and I think it’s true, is he’s so dry. When he’s serious, I think he’s joking; when he’s joking, I think he’s serious.

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.

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.

Any actor who tells you that he makes choices, absolutely, is wrong. You find work and work finds you.

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.

Celebrity is okay as long as you know it’s not about you.

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.

Corruption is something you face all the time. Avoid it.

With theatre, you have to be ready for anything.

The worst thing is to get involved with people who aren’t passionate about what they’re doing.

I’m no different to anyone else; I want people to like me. I just don’t particularly want them to understand me.

I’ve never had any close male friends. The most important relationships in my life have always been with women.

You can be intuitive when you’ve got a more expansive role. You can get into the poetry of telling the story rather than just pushing buttons.

It’s no fun for an actor to keep repeating what you did before. It’s always changing. I’m changing. The target keeps moving. That’s the beauty of it.

Action breeds inspiration more than inspiration breeds action.

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.

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.

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.

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.

I love theaters. I love the event of going there and seeing a movie with a lot of people. I like the community coming around the story.

Great theatre is about challenging how we think and encouraging us to fantasize about a world we aspire to.

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.