ANTONIO BANDERAS

There's something happening in the world that didn't happen before. We are acting like one big brain.

If you call a cat, he may not come. Which doesn't happen with dogs. They're different types of animals. Cats are very sexy I think too in the way they move.

I've done many different movies in many different contexts.

I completely take on the risk, the poker game, which being an artist means, and I'm going to try to make a film which honestly reflects what I have in my head.

Expectation is the mother of all frustration.

I used to be scared of women. When I was very young they terrified me, but discovering the female universe was incredible and still is to this day, as you never stop learning about them.

I've always been an optimistic guy, to tell you the truth.

A couple of years after I arrived in Hollywood, everything that was Latino was fashionable, and years after, my thought is that we're not fashionable anymore. We're here to stay.

I've never liked watching real-life couples play couples onscreen or onstage. It takes me out of the story.

It was an honor and privilege to arrive to this country 16 years ago with almost no money in my pocket. A lot has happened since then.

You see a woman, 22 years old, going out with a guy over 60 - and it's kind of natural. But if it happens in the opposite direction everyone says, 'What is going on there?'

When you go to the movie theater and the opening of this movie and you see the kids just cracking up with a character you are giving your voice to, you get goose bumps. It's so beautiful.

Picasso is a character that has pursued me for a long time and I always rejected. He deserves a lot of respect because I am from Malaga, and I was born four blocks from where he was born.

I don't think there is a guy that played more gay characters than I have done in my life.

One thing I have clear is that I don't want to work for money anymore.

I think the problems with being older come when your body cannot do what your mind wants. Then, Houston, we have a problem.

I did my first movie, 'The Mambo Kings,' in America without speaking the language. I learned the lines phonetically. I had an interpreter actually just to understand directions from my director.

Making movies is difficult and you get disorientated sometimes - even when you're working with fantastic talent.

Characters don't belong to anyone, not even the person who plays them.

I drink a bucket of white tea in the morning. I read about this tea of the Emperor of China, which is supposedly the tea of eternal youth. It's called Silver Needle. It's unbelievably expensive, but I get it on the Web.

I remember in 'Law of Desire,' where I played a homosexual, that people were more upset that I kissed a man on the mouth than I killed a man. It's interesting to see how people can pardon you for murdering a man, but they can't pardon you for kissing one.

As an actor, when you encounter a psychopathic personality, you naturally want to make him 'bigger than life,' as the Americans say.

Up until the time I was 31 years old, in Spain, I still didn't know how I was going to pay the rent.

Everything changes as you get older - your mind, your body, the way you view the world.

I'm still a promising actor. It's better to be climbing even if you have a lot of falls than to be descending. Maybe that's kept me young. I haven't gotten to any peak yet.