Paul Dano Quotes

The bottom line is we go to theatre to vicariously spend time with really intense characters.

I think suspense is a big thing.

Every time I go to the theater, there's something about the atmosphere, seeing something unfold live in front of an audience, that you can't get out of your system.

People love to be told stories, but it's the sugar that draws you into the theater.

Just like all great stories, our fears focus our attention on a question that is as important in life as it is in literature: What will happen next?

On stage, I am in the dark.

I love theater. I love sitting in an audience and having the actors right there, playing out what it means to be a human being.

I love plays. Even bad ones. I like the fact that actual live, breathing people are standing before you in tense situations that you are not personally responsible for.

I was convinced that acting was for fools. I was on the stage when I was eight with my father, he was playing one of those Greek blind guys that sees things and warns people, whilst I was in a blue skirt. I think there were 5,000 people in the theatre, it was ridiculous.

I don't enjoy the theatre. I don't go. Don't like going in the back door or the front.

For me, a theatre is a dark place. It should be mysterious; it's where we go to get away from all the utilitarian things we do in the daylight.

Great theater continues to bind us, one to the other, and most of us will travel far and wide to see a good story told well.

I love the theater because it's alive. It's a beginning, a middle and an end, and it begins a life.

My mum took me to the theatre a lot, and I'd obsess over them for weeks after. She took me to see 'The Blue Room' at The Royal Exchange when I was 13, and that was a profound moment for me - I remember really wanting to be an actor. It really spoke to me like nothing else had before.

I work in theater, so I am always working in front of empty chairs. They represent a future presence. They are never just chairs.

I was in the sixth grade and living in Germany, when I was hanging out late with some friends. I turned around, and there's a dude dressed up as Michael Myers following us all the way home. It was the scariest thing ever, and it always reminds me of Halloween. In my mind, I was so young, so I really thought it was Mike Myers following me home.

Normally, you spend the play convincing people of the world and the characters.

The Wicked Witch of the West really scared me as a child.

Growing up, I was afraid of the dark.

When I was around 13 or 14, there were visits to the theater, which really ignited my passion. Going to see live theater is when I properly got the bug and hoped I'd be able to do it for a living one day.

I miss doing a straight play.

People don't come to the theatres to watch a kiss. It's the story that appeals to them.

Plays are about understanding what happens, what it means. If we just leaned into the story, for lack of a better word, it would still be a powerful story but, like delight, it might disappear an hour after you saw it.

I remember my first role as a sunflower at nine.

We're moved by emotions and characters and stories. We love that.