When I did a scene with Dharam sir for the first time, I actually cried!
If I'm not good at acting, I'm not good at anything else.
When I did 'Guffman,' it was terrifying. I didn't know what to say. I started talking, and it just came out.
I could have made a lot of money doing 'Golden Girls,' and I would have been good. But the image of it! And for me to work with Betty White every day would be like taking cyanide.
Losing my teeth didn't impede my acting, but it was a constant worry and meant I was never completely relaxed.
Olivia Newton-John was our first choice to play Sandy, but she was nervous about acting, whether she would feel comfortable with us and could pull it off at all.
I don't mind watching plays once in a while, but as long as I don't have to be in them.
I suffer from stage fright, so I blabber on stage and stop midway through my performances. I cannot even write a cheque, as it makes me nervous. Being around people makes me nervous. But I'm very comfortable in front of the camera, and this I realised many films later.
Usually when I see myself in a film or on television, there's about a six-month period where I can't look at it because all I'll see are the mistakes. I'm just appalled by the person that I see.
I writhe when I see myself on the screen. I'm such a dreadfully clumsy hulking image. I say to myself, "Why doesn't he get off? Why doesn't he get off?" I mean, I look like such an idiot. Some fat awkward thing dredged up from some third-rate drama company. I must stop thinking about it, otherwise I shan't be able to go on working.
In 1977, at age ten, I was cast on the TV sitcom 'Good Times.' My character was Penny, an abused child in desperate need of love. I really didn't want to do the show. I didn't want to be away from my family.
It is very difficult for me to accept the fact that I am acting in front of the camera.
I think a lot of actors, sometimes what happens I think is that actors finish a movie and they go, 'Oh my god, I'm never going to work again,' even big huge actors, and so they'll take something thinking that something else will never come along.
My parents met because my father was an actor friend of one of my mom's brothers, but my mother has never set foot on the stage - she's quite shy. So it's a strange thing because people say, 'Oh, coming from acting parents,' when the idea of acting would literally make my mother just want to throw up.
I always hate it when I see the wrong person in massive roles, so for me, my biggest fear would be accepting a role I thought I wouldn't find the rhythm of.
When I am making a film, I know what to do in front of a camera. What frightens me are the scenes with dialogue. Sometime they really want me to speak perfectly and I don't like that.
I was kind of scared of failing at acting.
After every single take, I laugh. It's my own awkwardness and discomfort about being an actor.
I hate watching myself, as do a lot of actors.
I remember secretly going off and crying. All of a sudden I'm being blocked and have to be intimate in a scene, and I'm going, 'I can't even look people in the eye very well. How am I ever going to do this?'
I have a really hard time watching my sister act in anything but especially anything where it's a strong emotion. Whether she's crying or she's angry or she's - whatever emotion she's feeling I actually think that she's feeling it and I want to hug her and make it all better.
I don't think any actor feels comfortable watching themselves in movies. You must be very narcissistic. The problem with your own opinion of yourself is that contrary to the normal spectators, when you watch a film you are in, you only watch yourself.
Being on a set for the first time is in general an overwhelming experience, and coming into 'Sharp Objects' was already nerve-wracking enough with the cast - it's just such a talented group of people and it'd be kind of strange if you weren't nervous.
It's kind of my biggest fear: thinking I know somebody I'm going to be, and then I don't. It's probably only happened to me once or twice, but that was enough for me to definitely not do a role unless I 100% can be that person.
I really dislike watching myself on screen. I am very insecure about my acting. We are our own biggest critics. I have to sit in another room to my parents when they watch it.
