John Waters Quotes

I never hoped that both my children would become actors. I expected them to do something else.

I had the privilege of being able to choose, or at least have the opportunity to work at, being anything but an actor.

I decided in my late teens that I wanted to be an actor, and my dad and I agreed that films were better. I work alongside my dad, you see. I've thought that films were better since I was a kid.

If you look at my career, I've taken on a lot of risky roles.

I've always been selective about my roles.

My brother and I were both teenage writers, and he was, I have to say, better than I was, but he went into science, and I went into writing.

I had very few skills. If I hadn't been a producer I'd been a failed actor. That would have been really disastrous.

I don't want to be an actress, because I think that they have to be really pretty, and I'm not.

As an actor, you get hired for what you last did. And I guess it just becomes your choice or obligation to do different things.

And I don’t want to turn actress. I want to do both. I wouldn’t have built the confidence to do acting if I didn’t model.

My father wanted to be an actor, dreamed about being an actor, but he gave it up because my mom and his family told him, "You're never going to make it; it's too tough out there."

Creativity or talent, like electricity, is something I don't understand but something I'm able to harness and use.

What did my parents say when I told them I wanted to be an actor? 'Be a plumber.'

I did not want to be an actor because my whole family did it-going into the family business was the last thing I wanted to do.

I think I was about 16 when I first figured I wanted to be an actor. I wanted to be a fighter pilot before that, but then I thought I don't want to kill people so that ruled that out.

In my teens I fancied myself an artist; I hung out with the eccentric art teacher at my high school, painted still lifes and portraits and landscapes in watercolor and acrylics, took private lessons, won some blue ribbons for my earnest renderings. My lack of talent did little to dampen my enthusiasm. In college I thought I'd continue, but, like Salieri, I quickly realized that while I had the ability to appreciate art, I wasn't actually very good.

When an actor is offered a role, more often than not - maybe 90 percent of the time - you read it and you say, "I'll take it."

I'm a character actor, so as a character actor, I'm always looking for something interesting.

I think I became an actor because I couldn't sing.

Actors should ACT. Not sell perfume, or write cookbooks.

The careers that I admire and actually try to emulate are those of Julianne Moore and Annette Bening. Those women, to me, make amazing choices. They're sexy, beautiful women, but that doesn't dictate their choices.

You don't need qualifications as an actor or a politician. And I didn't want to be a politician.

I remember all the kids picking their chosen career paths and I was thinking, If I'm an actor I can be an astronaut and a policeman and a firefighter. At the time I was so young that I actually thought actors were all of those things.

There's nothing wrong with making little kids happy, but there's nothing wrong with wanting to be an adult actress. I mean a grown-up actress.

I don't care if people perceive me as always selling out because I'm doing a studio picture. For me, the whole thing is you should be diverse in your choices; that's the beauty of being an actor, you should be able to do that.