Cameron Monaghan Quotes

If you judge everything by how photographically real it looks, then you're missing out on a lot of what art is about and what communication is. There are ambiguities in life, and that should be reflected in art, cinema, and storytelling, I think.

Photography is a pursuit that allows you to be very hands-on with what you show people of either yourself or the art you want to make, and acting is kind of the exact opposite. You do have a modicum of creative freedom as an actor, but you're still very much a cipher for other people's art.

I think the characters are supposed to be an open book, blank canvas.

Logic works, metaphysics contemplates.

It's your job as an actor to fill out the blanks. I love doing that. To fill in the bones.

The great thing about animation is it's like the radio. I used to do lots of radio when I was a kid, and you get to play parts you would never get to play ordinarily.

I think writers like to see how people bring their words to life, and it's always surprising. Always, no matter what, whether it's good or bad, it's always surprising because a whole human being is coming to that piece of writing.

I think journalists and filmmakers are keen observers. And actors must also be sharp observers as they draw their characters and their stories from what they experience around them. After all, that is what actors, filmmakers, journalists are trained to be: observers. And then they do something with their observations.

I am a fictionalizing philosopher, not a novelist.

When you're creating a character out of nothing, you have to make all the guesses as to how they walk, how they talk, how they think. It was all there on the table for us to pick and choose for Murrow.

The work itself has a complete circle of meaning and counterpoint. And without your involvement as a viewer, there is no story.

You make a movie, and if somebody reads something into it, then great, more power to him.

You can't do without philosophy, since everything has its hidden meaning which we must know.

I always hate explaining away songs, because for me they mean something, and for other people, they'll mean something absolutely different.

I don't tend to cast roles in my head because I spend so much time with these characters and the drawings that they're complete in themselves, you know what I mean?

Whenever you're talking about meaning, basically... I think a lot of the human experience has to do with trying to understand what things mean, and there's not really any tools to do that unless you're thinking about it in a more spiritual or philosophical realm.

Initially, I studied philosophy, because it claimed to give you answers to the meaning of existence, but it didn't: It was basically a semantics game.

I think once you write fiction, you put it out, and it can be interpreted in a variety of ways, some of which are going to be shocking to the writer.

My purpose is to explain, not the meaning of words, but the nature of things.

I love creating new characters that are whatever they are.

Probably the only way Woody Allen and I are similar is that he has a lot to say about Nietzsche.

When you create a character, you create it for yourself - you do whatever you want. It's your job to explore it in as many different avenues as you can in order to make it a fully wounded character.

When you are preparing for a role, you have a script to comb through and the writer's help in telling you about the character, and then you can fill in the gaps. When you are doing a cabaret show, it's very personal. You have the opportunity to share parts of yourself with an audience and figure out how you want to connect.

I have always believed that an artiste needs to respond to a story first. One has to feel it in order to live it.

For as long as I can remember, I was always creating random characters.