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When I was about 16 or 17, I had a teacher who took a group of us to the National Theater in Washington, D.C., and I saw Ian McKellen do his one-man show - I think it was called Acting Shakespeare - and it completely bombed me it put the zap on my brain in a big way.

Edward Norton

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Edward Norton
Age: 55
Born: 1969
Born: August 18
Actor
Character Actor
Environmentalist
Film Actor
Film Director
Film Producer
Journalist
Screenwriter
Stage Actor
Television Actor
Boston
Massachusetts
Edward Harrison Norton
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More quotes by Edward Norton

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The Zionist Tulsa Jew who's pugnacious is a reality. I grew up around it. And I think it's really, really funny and surprising and unlikely.
Edward Norton
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Well, I don't feel that I've played so many bad guys, and I'm rot really drawn to villains per se. I think a lot of people relate to some of my characters' inner struggles.
Edward Norton
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When I think about directing a film, the thing that stops me short is wondering if I'm a natural at it the way I think you, and PTA, and Fincher are born directors. Maybe some people's talent is in understanding the ways that film communicates, without dialogue, without plot.
Edward Norton
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I remember as a kid having the offer of a scholarship, that it was going to be like going to Mars, and deciding to stay in my public school.
Edward Norton
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I had a huge advantage with Edward Norton because he's directed a movie before, so one thing he appreciates is how hard my job is, he's very sensitive to that. We actually ended up finishing Leaves of Grass a day early.
Edward Norton
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To me, Fight Club was a comedy. When [David] Fincher sent me the book and I read it, the first thing I asked him was, This is a comedy, right? he said, Yeah, that's the whole point, and I said, Okay, I'm in. I certainly wasn't imagining myself as a dramatic actor when I was running around in my underwear in that film.
Edward Norton
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If I'm trying to put size on for a role, then I don't do much running.
Edward Norton
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When I was very small, I had that first-time-you-see-a-play experience, which immediately made me want to act, because it seemed like this incredible outlet for something I was already doing fairly compulsively anyway, which was putting on hats and costumes and doing funny voices. It was a very natural compulsion for me.
Edward Norton
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I like to get into a lot of things besides movies. I've been very involved with a few specific efforts. We built this park in New York and it's been a very successful project... I worked on a conservation project in East Africa... Too much of this type of stuff can get you wrapped up in your own work and I love it.
Edward Norton
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I always felt that acting was an escape, like having the secret key to every door and permission to go into any realm and soak it up. I enjoy that free pass.
Edward Norton
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I start to get fixated on a story and a character and an idea, and at a certain point, I really want to do it. It's a compulsion to explore a specific thing, as opposed to a compulsion to direct, generally speaking.
Edward Norton
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I thought Rounders was a comic movie in its way. First time I directed a movie, I wanted to do a comedy. I don't like things that are superficially one thing or another, mainly. My favorite comedies are really smart, too, and have a lot of levels to them as well.
Edward Norton
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As an actor, I don't have any politics. As an actor, I'm driven more by an authentic - I would say an obsessive-compulsive-disorder level-fixation on mimicry, tonality of voice, to literally imitate something until I can just disappear into it.
Edward Norton
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As we say in the sewer, if you're not prepared to go all the way, don't put your boots on in the first place.
Edward Norton
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To cite my own alma mater, it's shocking to me that Yale University can teach what it teaches at the Yale School of Environmental Studies and utterly fail to mirror those values in any way in its investment practices.
Edward Norton
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The deeper you go with the character, the more you see the layers start to peel away. It's more challenging to me, but it's also just interesting. Those are the things I like to watch. I like to watch the evolutions of something.
Edward Norton
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A lot of why I do something is just the novelty of the experience.
Edward Norton
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With Edward Norton you'd never say, This is the one we're going with whether you like it or not. It has to be agreed upon.
Edward Norton
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I don't have anything to prove to anybody, which is a lovely place to be.
Edward Norton
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If there's a criteria that really gets me interested in a work besides any type of personal interaction with the theme, it's if I feel like this is the right piece of work for that director at that moment in their career.
Edward Norton