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I love Sam Neill. The thing that I always say about him, and I think it's true, is he's so dry. When he's serious, I think he's joking when he's joking, I think he's serious.

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
Thinking
Joking
Dry
Serious
True
Thing
Always
Love
Think

More quotes by Willem Dafoe

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I was watching 'Wild at Heart,' and I can honestly say I did nothing for that apart from show up!
Willem Dafoe
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When I give over to somebody's vision rather than have an idea of what I need to do, it takes me to places I wouldn't have got to by myself. I'm always attracted to a strong director.
Willem Dafoe
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I don't have a preference between theatre and film I like to do both. But I will say that there's something about theatre that is more nourishing and sustaining than film ever can be.
Willem Dafoe
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If you get stuck and it feels a little stiff, then you do have to mess it up to find it. But other times it's really written and you just stick to your guns and do it as elegantly and as concentrated and as committed as you can.
Willem Dafoe
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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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There's a real wisdom to not saying a thing.
Willem Dafoe
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I think, as I've gotten older, I've been able to be more reckless with my choices, because practically speaking, you get less careful. Your choices become more instinctive, and you feel like if you make a mistake, it won't destroy you.
Willem Dafoe
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It's true in the beginning I started playing villains, and I think that's pretty clear, because if you don't conventionally look a certain way and you've got a certain kind of presence when you're young, then what's available to you is character roles, and the best character roles when you're young tend to be villains.
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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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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I don't think people are interested in my personal life. I've never had a Hollywood life. I've always been a worker.
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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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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My dad was a surgeon, my mom a nurse, and they were always out working. I had five sisters and a brother. They didn't care what I got up to.
Willem Dafoe
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When I was a kid I was very interested in the idea of the will, finding out what you're capable of. I liked those kind of challenges.
Willem Dafoe
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I don't worry so much about the audience. I want them very much to be involved and enjoy the movie, but I try to just inhabit the character in a full way, where I can create a personal stake.
Willem Dafoe
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I'm an optimist. I hope if a movie's good that it will be a success, but as we know, that's not always true, just because of popular taste, advertising, distribution patterns - there's lots of reasons.
Willem Dafoe
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Mounting those red stairs [in Cannes] is something I've done with a very different intention many times. So it's interesting any time you witness those shifts of perspective. The beach scenes were also fun. It felt very strange and very theatrical to kind of commandeer it and have La Mer booming over the speakers.
Willem Dafoe
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Trust is always a factor. You've just got to look at the big picture, and you've got to look at the small picture - the small picture in the sense that you've got to make every scene work and you've got to deal with what people are presenting you with, too.
Willem Dafoe
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In my experience, sometimes a movie just hits at the wrong time, gets the wrong press, or gets the wrong representation, and it gets misunderstood.
Willem Dafoe