Character Selection Quotes

When I wrote about the French Revolution, I didn't choose to write about aristocrats; I chose characters who began their lives in provincial obscurity.

The first and foremost criterion for me when selecting a film is the character I am playing, and then the director.

I really suck at 'Smash Brothers.'

People say, 'Well, whose career do you follow? Where do you see your career going? What movie do you want to do next?' And I can't tell you what type of movie I would go and do next. I would have to read the script and feel for a character. And if I feel in my gut for a character, I know that that's somebody I have to play.

I don't think about the characters I choose to play, analytically or consciously.

I've been very lucky in the characters I've chosen. Up until last year I was a nobody. I did jobs I booked because I needed to put food in my mouth.

I don't act. I am the way I am, and choose roles that I think suit my body language.

It's not like I don't want to play the guy next door. But sometimes they're not the best written or the most complicated. But I am very, very particular about my bad boys. There are certain types of characters I will not play. I've said no so many times to so many parts that are just way too dark. You have to be careful.

I worked so hard on that role [of Debra in Dexter]. And I barely worked on Rita. But I read for casting - both parts - and they said, "That's great, we're going to bring you in for producers." So I read for some producers - both parts - and they said, "That's great, we're going to bring you in to meet the creator." And I went in, and as soon as I walked in the room, he looked at me and he said, "Oh my god, you're our Rita!" And I said, "No! I'm Deb! I'm a total Deb!" "No, you're Rita!".

It's better to play negative lead roles than portray just any other character on the show.

I think that each character has fascinated and interested me enough to want to play him.

Generally, if a good script comes in I read it, and if it appeals to me, it appeals to me. And it doesn't have to be anything - it doesn't have to be the main character, it doesn't have to be a huge part. It could be a nice cameo - anything that I think is good and surrounded by good, enthusiastic people.

You can't sit here and try to predict what kind of character I'm going to be drawn to next. At the time when I read 'The Girl on the Train,' it wasn't like I was, 'Ooh, I want to play a hot mess next.'

When you sign up for a TV show, you don't know if it's going to be for a pilot or for the rest of your life, so I wanted to play a character that I enjoyed thoroughly, and there weren't that many of them out there.

For Marvel, we've never looked at any of our characters in terms of gender, race, or religion. It truly is about, who is the best character for the story? If that character happens to be a woman, fantastic.

You have to make sure you have the characters you want. That's really the most complicated part.

I don't pick my roles by genre; that's kind of silly.

Inspiration is key for me in choosing characters.

I really only take roles that I love and that I have some kind of innate compulsion or need to tell that story. Although it's almost like I have no control over it. It's like they choose me.

I like to take people you wouldn't really think people would write novels about: an aqueduct engineer, a code-breaker, a hedge-fund manager. It's in those sorts of lives that I find more fascination than in a CIA operative or a Marine or something like that.

I think the first thing I consider is whether I like the script. Once that is done, the next thing I look for is my part in the movie. Many a times you come across good offers, but the part they are offering might not be challenging. So, I don't take up that film.

People say they love the characters I've chosen in my career. But I didn't choose anything. I just happened to be working and these were offered to me.

There's so many characters they [studios] are not letting me play. And I thought, "Why don't you just go produce it yourself?".

I do not want to be a part of Hindi cinema's rat race. But yes, if I get offers and characters which I feel would suit me as well as make some difference to me, I will do a Hindi film.

I started deliberately looking for characters, ideally outsiders and ideally Americans. So I just started reading widely, as I tell my students to do: read voraciously and promiscuously.