Quote

I try to find out what there is in the character that in a way, you can't put into words. If I could put it into words, then it wouldn't be a performance. And if I do put it into words, as I play it, I start to get boxed in by those words.

Alan Alda

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Alan Alda
Age: 88
Born: 1936
Born: January 28
Actor
Film Actor
Film Director
Podcaster
Screenwriter
Television Actor
Television Director
Television Presenter
Writer
Manhattan borough
New York City
Alphonso Joseph D’Abruzzo
Character
Find
Play
Boxed
Trying
Performance
Way
Performances
Wouldn
Start
Words

More quotes by Alan Alda

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What then are doing if not creating a better place together? I think, for me the key has to be, what do I want to create? What is it I want to leave behind?
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Republicans are as capable of coming up with great ideas and moving this country along as anyone - they just don't do it.
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Insanity is just a state of mind.
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People who laugh together generally don't kill each other.
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Kids are natural scientists.
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There are two things that I get a lot of pleasure from in my life, and that is, doing what I know how to do well - that really makes me happy. The other one, and probably an equal pleasure, is finding out how I can be helpful and then really being helpful.
Alan Alda
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I'm in the real world, some people try to steal from me, and I stop them, frequently, take them to court. I love a good lawsuit. It's fun.
Alan Alda
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How can I ever hope to communicate something to you unless I get signals back from you that I'm on the right track or that I've started at some place that you're familiar with?
Alan Alda
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Be as smart as you can, but remember that it is always better to be wise than to be smart.
Alan Alda
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I found I wasn't asking good enough questions because I assumed I knew something. I would box them into a corner with a badly formed question, and they didn't know how to get out of it. Now, I let them take me through it step by step, and I listen.
Alan Alda
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I've played a murderer, so certainly I think I can play a Republican.
Alan Alda
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Testosterone Poisoning: … Until now it has been thought that the level of testosterone in men is normal simply because they have it. But if you consider how abnormal their behavior is, then you are led to the hypothesis that almost all men are suffering from ‘testosterone poisoning.’
Alan Alda
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In 2003, I almost died of an intestinal blockage when I was on a mountain in Chile, filming a segment for 'Scientific American Frontiers.'
Alan Alda
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My mother didn't try to stab my father until I was six, but she must have shown signs of oddness before that.
Alan Alda
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Loneliness is everything it's cracked up to be.
Alan Alda
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A really great actor, in a lucky performance, can transform himself or herself. I've seen actors do that. But often it's a mechanical transformation, which isn't as interesting, and you've got to be careful how you go about something like that, I think.
Alan Alda
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Begin challenging your own assumptions. Your assumptions are your windows on the world. Scrub them off every once in awhile, or the light won't come in.
Alan Alda
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Awards can give you a tremendous amount of encouragement to keep getting better, no matter how young or old you are.
Alan Alda
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It makes it fun. When an actor plays a character, you want what that character wants. Otherwise it doesn't look authentic. So I really want to defeat Jimmy - I mean Jimmy as the character.
Alan Alda
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What I always wanted to get seen as was as a good actor, when it was the acting I was doing. When I'm writing, I want to try to be seen as a good writer.
Alan Alda