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Corporate Hollywood thinks I'm a geek to go back and do theater. They don't understand why I don't want to be a movie star, why I'm not pursuing Mel Gibson's roles.

William Petersen

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William Petersen
Age: 71
Born: 1953
Born: February 21
Actor
Film Actor
Film Producer
Stage Actor
Television Actor
Television Producer
Evanston
Illinois
William Louis Petersen
Back
Thinks
Thinking
Star
Theater
Hollywood
Roles
Gibson
Movie
Pursuing
Stars
Geek
Understand
Corporate

More quotes by William Petersen

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I've been telling anybody who would listen that I wanted to do a series for the last 10 years. But I wouldn't do it if I was just another cop pushing bad guys up against the wall.
William Petersen
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I didn't want to play a lawyer. I didn't want to play a doctor. I didn't want to play a single dad. I wanted to do something I felt I could learn from, something that would be a challenge and something that would not dry up.
William Petersen
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I can't figure out how they decide on those things. So I don't have any regrets about anything that I did that didn't get a lot of people to see it.
William Petersen
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I want to live and work in Chicago for the rest of my life. You know when you were growing up and you wanted to become president? What I want now is to be mayor of this damned town in ten years.
William Petersen
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I do the work just because I enjoy it on the day, working with the guys. For me, it's like going to play a game of baseball: you've got your teammates, you get to do something that's fun, hopefully, and whatever happens with that stuff is in the cosmos someplace.
William Petersen
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Grissom is pretty asexual. He's not that interested in anything other than work - except for Lady Heather. She's the closest to getting his heart of anyone.
William Petersen
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I know a lot of actors who've just gotten bitter because they did something and then nobody ever saw it or whatever.
William Petersen
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One of the things I love about theater, one of the reasons I'll never give it up, is that it's fifty percent the audience's responsibility.
William Petersen
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Writing is a vessel...with readers the ocean and authors as its sails.
William Petersen
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Grissom is a character who doesn't really want people poking around in his life. He likes to poke around in his work.
William Petersen
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I've never been in this business for the recognition or the awards. I just want to do good work, grab a decent paycheck, and move onto the next job.
William Petersen
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Theater in Chicago will always be my first love.
William Petersen
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Grissom comes from a place where we know he had a deaf mother, he was raised in a silent household, on some level, had a father who potentially was not around and he learned what he knew by himself in the back yard, with bugs and animals. He's not comfortable being a supervisor and that's his problem.
William Petersen
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I think you can find yourself on one of these shows for a long period of time and think that all you'll ever be able to do is that character. Certainly people think of you that way.
William Petersen
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I get a lot of stuff from Germany - stuffed bugs and tarantulas.
William Petersen
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Sure, I always chose rebels to identify with - I still do - but to me a rebel isn't so much someone who breaks the law as someone who goes against the odds.
William Petersen
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The show can go on without me, and probably will, but I want to come back to act in Chicago. My wife and I just bought a condo downtown, and I want to do theater.
William Petersen
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Basically, we are a whole world of people desperately trying to figure out what is the dark side of our natures and how much can we explore without becoming something else.
William Petersen
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Now I'm seen by more people in one episode than I was in 20 years of theatre and movies. It's gratifying to have an impact on 25 million people a night, but I can say goodbye to my lunch-pail life as a working actor. I'm scared I might be a celebrity.
William Petersen
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The beard is here because I got tired of shaving and Grissom, subsequently, got tired of shaving. Grissom, like any other 50-year-old man, is going through a series of mid-life changes. Who knows, he may start drinking.
William Petersen