Quote

The truth is, if you're around long enough, you have a story about everyone. But it's best to keep your mouth shut sometimes.

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
Stories
Truth
Shut
Best
Mouth
Enough
Mouths
Sometimes
Story
Long
Everyone
Keep
Around

More quotes by 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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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 mask can be a limitation, but you just deal with it. You do get superhuman strength and pumpkin bombs and all this other stuff to express yourself with.'
Willem Dafoe
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I was doing community theater, and I was always interested in acting, but I was also interested in sports. I was interested in a lot of things. I was a pretty normal guy. I wasn't like a guy who grew up in a dark theater watching movies.
Willem Dafoe
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When you have something to work with, then you fly with it.
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 try to attach myself to people who really inspire me, and directors who are really passionate. That way, I can give myself more fully and trust the impulse behind why the film is being made, and I can be a little more irresponsible in finding out what the character is.
Willem Dafoe
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I love doing action and stuff the problem is usually action movies are not that interesting. Also as I get older I feel like there's less opportunities for me.
Willem Dafoe
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Any actor who tells you that he makes choices, absolutely, is wrong. You find work and work finds you.
Willem Dafoe
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The Midwest isn't somewhere you mix with those from the performing arts. But my mum and dad would go off to Chicago every so often to see shows. They would bring back the albums and the movies, those little eight metres, and we would all watch. I think that was when I fell in love with acting.
Willem Dafoe
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I pride myself on being fairly polite on a set so it's kind of a guilty pleasure to poke others on the set.
Willem Dafoe
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Sometimes I think women are lucky because they can develop in ways men can't. The old-boy network may be oppressive to women, but it actually stunts men in terms of personal growth.
Willem Dafoe
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The best thing an actor can be is ready. Be flexible, be ready.
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
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It's too easy to trivialize people. The Internet does it all the time.
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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I feel like it's important to be flexible, particularly when I'm coming in late in the game and I'm connective tissue in the story. I'm not at the very center. It's important for me to have a certain kind of flexibility and try to help people do what they need to do.
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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When you work on anything, you want to find the range of impulses - which ones get portrayed is another question, but you want to have that complexity and that fullness, even if you're playing a cartoon character.
Willem Dafoe
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Weirdness is not my game. I'm just a square boy from Wisconsin.
Willem Dafoe