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All the time, as an actor, you want to be asking what's next and where things are going. If you're not asking those questions, you're not growing.

Willem Dafoe

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Willem Dafoe
Age: 69
Born: 1955
Born: July 22
Film Actor
Film Producer
Model
Performing Artist
Screenwriter
Stage Actor
Voice Actor
Appleton
Wisconsin
William J. Willem Dafoe
William James Dafoe
Things
Time
Questions
Asking
Actor
Growing
Actors
Next
Going

More quotes by Willem Dafoe

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I never act. I simply bring out the real animal that's in me.
Willem Dafoe
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A lot of critics are lazy. They don't want to look closely and analyze something for what it is. They take a quick first impression and then rush to compare it to something they've seen before.
Willem Dafoe
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I prefer shooting on location, just because it always helps you. You go some place, you put your life on hold even more than when you've settled in some place. You can make a new life so it opens yourself up to the make-believe and the imagination in a way when you aren't burdened by things that remind you of your life all the time.
Willem Dafoe
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I'm never in Hollywood! I'm a theatre actor that lives in New York. I'm very seldom in Los Angeles. I don't dislike LA, I just don't think it's a very healthy place for me to be all the time. When I'm shooting a movie there and am working I'm perfectly happy. But when I'm not working or engaged in something it's a place that I wouldn't live.
Willem Dafoe
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I'm one of those people who when I go over a bridge, I want to jump. It's just this intense tickle in the back of my throat. It's like I'm on the verge the whole time I'm walking over that bridge, and I'm not going to get a release until I jump.
Willem Dafoe
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There's a real wisdom to not saying a thing.
Willem Dafoe
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I'm not attracted to naturalism, I'm not attracted to behavior, I'm attracted to dance. I'm attracted to gesture, I'm attracted to singing with your voice, as opposed to having a natural manner. I'm a theater actor first, so that probably influences a lot of my approach. And I think in many ways, naturalism has ruined movies.
Willem Dafoe
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The real difficulty for smaller films, when they're made independently and it's time to go for a distributor, sometimes if it's a tough film and the people who financed it need their money back right away, it's much easier and lucrative to take a DVD deal.
Willem Dafoe
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I aspire to be an instrument of the director. I'm happiest like that. The stronger the director, the more I'm willing to give them.
Willem Dafoe
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I've been in very few flat-out comedies. But I feel like I've always made comedies.
Willem Dafoe
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Film is fragmented and gets into lots of other people's hands. There are a lot of pleasures that theatre gives me. You get to perform uninterrupted.
Willem Dafoe
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The worst thing is to get involved with people who aren't passionate about what they're doing.
Willem Dafoe
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I don't think people want to see me as a regular guy. Besides, I'm a regular guy in real life. I guess I just want to be reckless in my work.
Willem Dafoe
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Plenty of bad movies are very successful, and plenty of good movies are not. And distribution is so crazy, some films won't even get their day in court.
Willem Dafoe
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I guess they often cast me as the bad guy, because I'm not, er, conventional looking. I look sort of violent. I'm the odd one out, the outsider.
Willem Dafoe
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Central to being an actor is pretending, and the adventure of it all. That's why you become a junkie for different kinds of situations.
Willem Dafoe
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Let's hope I never end up on a deserted island, because I could never make a decision on which three CDs to take with me.
Willem Dafoe
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I am confident only when I am constantly in motion. Between projects, the doubt creeps in.
Willem Dafoe
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Celebrity is okay as long as you know it's not about you.
Willem Dafoe
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I set myself challenges every time I work. Ideally I approach everything as though it's the first time - with a beginner's mind and an amateur's love.
Willem Dafoe