Romany Malco Quotes

The best actors instinctively feel out what the other actors need, and they just accommodate it.

There's a Zen to acting, by being in the moment. That's where the power is.

There's no doubt in the world that directing makes you a better actor. Me, anyway. There's no doubt in the world that it makes me a more collaborative actor.

I always try to stick to the script because I want to respect the writers, and I want to respect the director. But if the director and my fellow actors are okay with me playing with it a little bit, then I definitely want to play with it.

Improv relies just as much on listening as it does you delivering dialogue. That's the hard for some people. Some people just concentrate on what they're going to say, and they're not listening. You have to listen in order to see where the other person is going to.

I just love the process of working with other actors. It's like jamming with a musician, except it takes a little more effort to get to that place as an actor, because you have the cameras and lights and everything. But I love jamming with these people.

An actor finds things in the moment with a director and other actors that you don't have time to hand-draw or animate with a computer.

I try to really focus on the actors I'm working with and kind of read and respond to their behavior.

There's an impression that actors make a lot of choices. I just take what's there.

I learned one thing from De Niro: He taught me to listen. Nobody says anything strictly from the script. It's improvised. It was the best piece of advice I have ever gotten in my life. It has helped me through the past thirty years.

In acting there's two different things: You're either pitching in a scene, or you're catching.

What I enjoy most with acting is when it's a good scene with one or two other actors, and you feel a strong connection, and you don't know how you're going to respond, and everybody is listening to each other and getting affected by each other, and even though you've rehearsed it many times, it feels like it's happening right now.

Know your lines; otherwise, have an open mind because you want to get lost in the moment. When you have talented actors and directors to work with, then it's pretty easy to do.

With some actors, you can tell when they're acting all by themselves, no matter who else is in the screen.

All four of the actors in 'You're the Worst,' we all have strong theater backgrounds. We all play off of each other in that way that you would in theater. You kind of are up for anything out of the blue happening and getting it on film, you know? We're all just open to playing.

Actors will, in their mind, want to 'steal the scene,' and the problem is that means the scene didn't work in the first place.

If you're working opposite an actor who can act, then all you have to do is listen and respond.

I like to go off the other actors in the scene, which kind of stinks when you're acting with someone who's not that great.

I think one of the things about listening is that it's always at its most powerful when it's present, when it's right here, when it's right now. And that's a lesson about improv that I think just made me a much more social person.

I never like to sit and discuss my character, the other character, our relationship, or anything like that. I feel like if I did my job and I trust that the other person has done theirs, you just go on set, play around with it, chew the scene for a little bit; then we roll, and that's it.

You can do a whole scene in acting without ever checking in to what the other guy is saying - it's not going to come off great, but you can get through the scene - whereas in improv, that's gonna be impossible.

One of the things you learn at drama school is not to play the result, but just to play the moment.

I moved to Chicago in the early 1990s and I studied improvisation there. I learned some rules that I try to apply still today: Listen. Say yes. Live in the moment. Make sure you play with people who have your back. Make big choices early and often. Don't start a scene where two people are talking about jumping out of a plane. Start the scene having already jumped. If you're scared, look into your partner's eyes — you will feel better.

That's the thing about acting - it does have the feeling of downhill skiing. When it's really all going right, you know your lines, you know what's important to your character, you pick the strongest reactions possible to elements in the story. But then you let it all go and you're in the moment and stuff happens. It surprises you and it's super strong; it's like you're living life in a slightly heightened way in the time between "action" and "cut."

You're living your life the entire time in both worlds - it's not like they say, 'Action' and you're like, 'Here we go, we're in this thing,' because that's where bad acting comes from.