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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. "

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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

Hands

People

You

" In films you do a scene, you play around with it and unless you're doing a lot of reshooting, which no one has the luxury to do, you deal with the problem for a day and then you move on. On some level, it never allows you to go very deep into what performing is about. "

" In order to inhabit a character, you've got to embrace and empathise with them. "

" I'll never be able to really see a film that I'm in. "

" Emotionally men and women are different, but only as a result of the physical differences. It all comes back to our bodies. "

" 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. "

" Truth is, generally I like film festivals; somewhere at some level there's an exchange of ideas. "

" Sometimes I say I feel more like a dancer than an actor, because there are things implied about being an actor that I don't really like. I feel more comfortable with the word 'performer'. I like being the thing. I like being the doer. There's a factualness to it. And then certain resonances happen out of how you apply yourself physically. "

" With theatre, you have to be ready for anything. "

" Weirdness is not my game. I'm just a square boy from Wisconsin. "

" I think on some level, you do your best things when you're a little off-balance, a little scared. You've got to work from mystery, from wonder, from not knowing. "

" 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. "

" The English Patient' is about the coming together of a French-Canadian nurse, an English patient, a Sikh in a turban and me, Caravaggio, and each of us is seeking a resolution to our own problems. "

Willem Dafoe

Together

" Great theatre is about challenging how we think and encouraging us to fantasize about a world we aspire to. "

Willem Dafoe

Theatre

World

" I try to do as many of my own stunts as possible. If you keep on taking yourself out of the role you play, you lose the thread of the character. "

" 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. "

" 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. "

" It's no fun for an actor to keep repeating what you did before. It's always changing. I'm changing. The target keeps moving. That's the beauty of it. "

" I wish to Christ I could make up a really great lie. Sometimes, after an interview, I say to myself, 'Man, you were so honest - can't you have some fun? Can't you do some really down and dirty lying?' But the puritan in me thinks that if I tell a lie, I'll be punished. "

Willem Dafoe

Man

Lie

" The bad things about theatre get balanced by the good things in film and vice versa. So to tell you the truth, I love it when I can go back and forth - it feeds different parts of you and exercises different muscles. "

" Basically, when I hear the words 'family drama,' I run in the opposite direction. "

" You can be intuitive when you've got a more expansive role. You can get into the poetry of telling the story rather than just pushing buttons. "

Willem Dafoe

Got

Role

" I do know that I like to play characters that are sometimes a little on the outside - that's because it feels kind of romantic and sexier to me. I really think they are the people that we learn lessons from. "

" I've never had any close male friends. The most important relationships in my life have always been with women. "

" 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. "

" 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. "

" It makes me laugh when I hear a guy talking about being in touch with his feminine side. But I gravitate towards women; I identify with them. And I do cry very easily, more and more as I get older. "

" 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. "

" Any actor who tells you that he makes choices, absolutely, is wrong. You find work and work finds you. "

" 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. "