David Duchovny Quotes

I still think of myself as a stage actor. When I do film and television I try to implement what I was taught to do in theatre, to try to stretch into characters that are far from myself.

Working on camera is a different ballgame in the sense that it's far more intimate work, but the basics and the foundations of being able to create something that isn't necessarily your own instincts - is a character that you have inside your head - whether you're talking about television or film or theater, that still has to be the grounding work.

I'm an emotional actor. When I'm doing a scene, I really believe it. I live the part as long as I'm in the scene.

Obviously an actor draws on his own experience.

In acting, you draw so much on your private life.

I went through this realization that acting, at its heart, is the ability to manipulate your own emotions.

Acting is not just impersonating your character.

That's one of the things that's great about acting. You can play all the different aspects of a human being.

As an actor, you can't just imitate someone. You have to get under her skin.

As actors, we have to take characters, and we have to feel for them and ultimately become them, and share that on screen so that audience feels that.

I appreciate actors who work very hard to get at the truth of the character they're playing. That speaks to me, and I try to protect that process because I value the focus and intention behind it.

The most interesting part of filming is what the actors do. That's the primary link between the story and the audience.

When you play a character, you bring yourself into the character. You get a chance to shine and show your translation for the character and her state of mind.

When I say that the acting is sort of like a normal acting experience, I'm just talking about the interacting in actual scenes, like doing dialogue.

All my roles are character roles. On the other hand, there are those people who have an inner...I think we all do the same thing. You can't get by on aura alone. That I know. Everyone has to dig in. Everyone has to do the same set of, "What is this about? What is this character doing?" Everybody from Spencer Tracy to Brad Pitt to Jeffrey Tambor.

When I work, I really try to get absorbed in the character. Unless I want to do something playful with the camera, I'm not too worried about where the camera is or positions.

There's lots of incredible roles out there that I'd love to tackle, but there's a select group of actors I find myself gravitating towards, like Philip Seymour Hoffman or Sean Penn or Daniel Day-Lewis - real transformational actors.

I love acting... I really do. I love crawling into another character's skin. That's something that I've always, always, always, always wanted.

The worst acting is about imitation.

Actors are part of a certain percentage of people on this planet who have an emotional vocabulary as a primary experience. It's as if their life is experienced emotionally and then that is translated intellectually or conceptually into the performance.

Actors walk around wearing these little tool-belts of acting skills. And I just don't find that interesting to watch. I never want to see someone who clearly can cry at the drop of a hat. That's so uninteresting.

I try to steal from the best. Suck it all in. 'Taxi Driver' is really a bible for film actors, a master class. A lot of emotional power, a lot of emotional depth but it's contained and you just see the tip of the iceberg.

I have a constant sort of melancholy approach to acting that fuels me. I want to do everything.

A lot of male actors are method actors and they become the characters which they both were.

With 'Taxi Driver,' I had this eureka moment. I realized that acting could be much more than what I had been doing. I had to build a character that wasn't me.