Acting indicates what's going on.
As a producer, if you have that title, you can be involved pretty well.
As far as career advice, my father really couldn't give it out, because Hollywood was never for him. He was a writer.
Before Speed 2, I had been offered a lot of action movies. They're all sequels, in my opinion. I did Speed 2 because I was told it was foolproof.
Everybody acts like they're in a movie in most movies. That's why they stink.
I always look at something as how I would express it now.
I decided the way I want to make movies, and I've been doing it this way since I was 19. There will be certain sacrifices with that, but that's the way I want to do it.
I did not sense excitement on Lions Gate's part. But then the film started to make the rounds of what they call the Bel Air circuit.
I do try to stay away from the narcissism of it because that takes any sort of power that the characters have away.
I don't find movies interesting. I just want to do the movies that made me interested in getting into movies, and they're few and far between.
I don't have a problem with fame. I got into this business intending to be very successful, but I wanted it to be at my price.
I don't have five kids and several mortgages. If that was the case, doing a play might not be the prudent thing to do.
I don't like people who use the press to advance themselves in a way that they haven't earned as an actor, performer or director.
I don't think comedies are well made.
I enjoy stimulation on all levels. I think it makes me better as an actor.
I have a problem with the blatant celebrity exhibitionism that happens in this business and being sold purely as a brand.
I have a production company. I get to spend time with friends, read, and go to more ballgames than most people.
I have all this time between projects, and I'm not so sure that's a healthy thing. It's scary, because at 36 I'm woefully unqualified for anything else.
I like being part of a new voice, a new talent. That's exciting, so I try to look for that.
I like guys who are dealing with some kind of primal struggle. I know I've been labeled as playing some dark characters, but I think that's because of the context of the culture in the movies.
I made three movies in 1995 and I was unhappy with all of them: Sleepers, Incognito, and Speed 2.
I never turned down a movie because they wouldn't give me enough money.
I really tried to make movies I wanted to see. I thought that if I was good enough, somebody would always need me.
I think that's what I really liked about Narc: My character has a real operatic range in a way that older movies used to have.
I think The Exorcist is the best American horror movie ever made. Friedkin was at the top of his game.
I think you have to passionately express yourself at a consistent, normal rate just to be a vibrant, growing person.
I try to stay under the radar.
I want to be in a really good movie. What's the story, and how can I make that story in a different way? I always go from a story standpoint.
I wanted that raspy, painful sort of breathing that's hard to speak with. It gave me the excuse to have a lot of beer that night.
I was making a lot of independent movies before the independent movement.
I wasn't doing the John Hughes movies or the Bruckheimer movies. But that's because movies changed.
I won't just work gun for hire. I'm better as an actor if I have my hands in it.
I would never do something like Speed 2 again. If I'd wanted to make those kind of movies I could have signed up for five of them while it was in the can. It wasn't worth it to me. That was just an innocuous, boring movie.
I'm trying to find real behavior.
I've felt pretty creatively stimulated.
I've had regrets in the downtime and struggles in between, but I've made two movies in the past five years. I'm happy with them.
I've never made a movie for money. My movies have always done well critically in places like San Francisco and in urban centers, but they did not travel across seas.
If I had a certain laugh you'd never heard before, I'd rather you see it in character than on The Tonight Show.
If I had been born 6'9" and I had a really good outside jump shot, I would be lying if some part of me wasn't shaped to at least try basketball.
If I was coming into the business today, I wouldn't be in it. Knowing what I know, absolutely not.
If you invite People magazine into your house, and folks say, What great taste he has in his living room, you're doing that so they'll like you and go see your movie.
In the '70s, great actors made certain types of movies.
It's always what can I bring to something, not what the piece can do for me.
It's difficult because people still want you out there and it's such a competitive field now. Not just acting, but media attention. Everybody is famous these days. There's so many outlets.
It's easy to be a movie star. The shoes are already there. They just put you in the shoes.
It's interesting to help someone find their vocabulary. There would not have been a De Niro without a Scorsese.
It's really important that the director is following very closely the subtle maneuvering and eye contact and the body language.
Joe Montana goes up to the line and he has a set play. He's expecting the defense to be a certain way, as we can expect another actor to be.
Maybe dopey people who watch 12 soap operas a day actually believe you're the villain. I haven't experienced that.
Most of the people running the studios grew up watching movies of the '70s. Those are the movies that inspired them to be in this business.
Most of the time when you have flashbacks in movies, they're arbitrarily cut in.
Mostly I do films that mainstream Hollywood wouldn't touch.
Normally you think a play warms you up for a movie, and it does, but the opposite can happen as well.
Now, being on the cover of Vanity Fair is as important as being in great movies. The lines are very, very blurred.
Pacino's always played the suffering prince. I just find that interesting.
Sleepers was a little bloated and removed.
The camera has to be just right, and the performance has to mesh with it in just the right way to make it work.
There are certain things that I understand about myself and certain perceptions that lend itself to the business of acting.
There's a lot of vanity you can get in Hollywood without being a producer.
These days you have these kids who are hyped in one movie, which doesn't even necessarily do anything. Just the rules and boundaries are just absurd.
They wanted me for some form of acting that I was not able to do. I like Sandy Bullock, but I think she was in a different world.
Training Day was such a Hollywood movie; I didn't like it.
We're not going to key you in with music, with false reactions from the actors. We want that documentary behavioral feel.
When actors talk about research, they're just patting themselves on the back.
When you look at some of the most respected actors there are and the crap that they're in... it didn't used to be that way.
You can take a handful of dollars, a good story, and people with passion and make a movie that will stand up against any $70 million movie.
You had very good English actors, but they certainly didn't have the male factor; the sexuality was definitely suspect.
You know how many movies it took Tom Cruise before he was making 5, 6 million dollars? It probably took a billion dollars in box office.
You were much better growing up in '85 watching Jerry Rice, watching the fundamentals, the technique, the dedication.
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