Zachary Knighton Quotes

I knew I wanted to be an actor, and I didn't necessarily need or want to be famous or a celebrity actor. But I wanted to be somewhere where there would be no ceiling on what I could accomplish, and I felt like if I stayed in St. Louis I might have a really great regional theater career or something, but that I wasn't going to be able to get much further than that. And it felt like New York and L.A. were the two places where you could end up being a TV star or you could end up doing regional theater, which would have been fine as well.

When I was younger, all I wanted to do was be a singer, and then I got into a great acting class in New York and became obsessed with that.

I love the stage, I love the process of acting in theatre, but unfortunately, it doesn't pay the bills.

When I moved to New York out of college, that was my goal. To be a stage actress. And to do dramatic works. Like 'Madea', and 'Night, Mother', and 'Sam Shepard', and all that kind of stuff. That's what I really wanted to do.

I wanted to be a theater actress, but I thought it would be easier to get to New York and the theater if I had a name than if I just walked the streets as a little girl from California.

All my graduation money went to paying for bartending classes so I could have a side gig. I bartended for two months before I was supposed to move to New York and then two months later I got the job as an understudy in 'Sister Act' and haven't looked back since.

People get on a show and they fought tooth and nail. Almost 95% of the actors out there want to be on a television series. Then as soon as they get onto one, no, no, I want to be a movie star. This television series stuff, no, no no.

I really think that everybody would like to be an actor. Why wouldn't they? It's great work if you can get it. The one thing that prevents most people from saying, 'I'm just gonna go to Hollywood!' is that it seems unrealistic.

When we moved to L.A., I started going out for more commercials, and then one day they emailed me a movie script. The first thing I said was, 'No way. I love commercials.'

When I first broke into the acting industry, I taught spinning classes to support myself.

Of course I wanted an agent from the time I was like 5, but my mother was like, 'No, you're going to be normal, you're going to go to school, you're going to get good grades, you're going to play soccer, and if you do well, if you keep your grades up, you can do one community-theater show a year.'

I'm lucky enough to say my day job is acting. I cut my teeth as a theater actor and playwright in New York.

When I got 'Family Ties', I wasn't even thinking about being an actress. I thought I might become a window dresser.

I started, obviously, doing theater, and I always thought that I would; in a way, I always thought that I'd be a theater actor. When I was starting out, I didn't really plan on making films, actually.

I was living in New York City and flat broke. My next door neighbor was an actor and he always seemed to be having more fun than I was. He convinced me to give acting a shot, but because of my shyness I was sure it would be a lost cause.

Once I started working as a professional actor, it was like, 'Bye-bye waiting tables, bye-bye bartending, bye-bye all the cliched jobs actors do.' But after a year of not getting work, there's this really difficult conflict, like, 'Do I have to go back to being a waiter when people recognize me from a show?'

My dream was to be a working actress that would be working in theater.

At one time I thought he wanted to be an actor. He had certain qualifications, including no money and a total lack of responsibility.

As an actor, we're unemployed a lot, so I'm familiar with the stress of trying to get a gig, and sometimes you take shows that you don't really want to do to keep the money coming in.

After 'Spelling Bee,' I started landing more jobs... I got 'Candide' at New York City Opera.

I was always a secretary in the early days, before we decided we were brave enough to join Equity and see if this thing has any legs.

One of the big struggles for an actor is sometimes you have to take work that you don't necessarily want to do so you can pay rent.

I never imagined I was going to do movies. My dreams were to become a regional theater actor.

By the time 'Suits' had come around, I had been acting for maybe six years. 'Deal or No Deal' - I like to call it my very lucrative waitressing job. Most actors find a way to make a living while they're auditioning, and for me, holding a briefcase was an incredibly lucrative means of being able to pursue what I really wanted to do.

TV sort of picked up for me before my theater career did.