James Spader Quotes
I played cops and robbers and pirates and all the rest when I was a kid, but I didn't want to grow up and be an actor and play cops and robbers and pirates. I wanted to grow up and be that, be cops and robbers and pirates.
Quotes to Explore
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If people want to really know what's up with me then they can read one of my interviews.
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My dream as an actor growing up was always to challenge myself to different genres, different roles, and it's actually rare that an actor's given that opportunity to do that.
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My mum was no pushy parent. She would drop me off for auditions when I was in my teens at the Lyric Theatre, then give me my bus fare and say she would see me later at home. She wasn't hanging around in the wings geeing me on. I had to do it on my own; it was up to me.
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I gave up school. I gave up a really, really good job. I gave up a lot of stuff. I cut a lot of people out of my life so I could just focus on my fighting dreams.
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One trap you can fall into when playing someone iconic is to end up doing everything in an iconic way, no matter how pedestrian or mundane that thing is.
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A lot of my creative energy is spent coming up with a concept that, once I get it, I feel like it writes itself.
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I grew up in a house my parents built together on a mountain in Tennessee. When we moved in, the walls were still going up, we didn't have hot water, and we turned it into an amazing adventure.
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I don't like giving up hits and stuff, but I try not to show it. I don't want the hitter to see that something bothers me.
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Writers are not meant for action.
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I don't believe in a lot of schmoozing and buttering up. Not that you don't become friends in work. But I think it's a misconception that you have to do a lot of hanging before you work.
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I'm not going to comment about potential jobs in the future because that's a rabbit hole to go down and get caught up in, but all I'll say is I'll go where the good scripts are.
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Some musical directors have more chutzpah. They pick up the phone and talk people into giving. I prefer to call and say 'thank you' after the money has been contributed.
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I have given up reading books; I find it takes my mind off myself.
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I have met hundreds of young people doing just what George Romney did: using a hand up in tough times to become part of the American Dream.
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I grew up with artists and drag queens. These were just my neighbors and friends and the people who are raising me.
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To pump up consumer or government demand would force interest rates up and asset prices down, possibly by enough to destroy more jobs than are created.
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I've never experienced writer's block. When it's going really well, my body temperature goes up, and I'm flushed. I get quite delirious.
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My mom hates being on camera. My dad loves it - he eats it up!
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The reality is that the only way change comes is when you lead by example.
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I guess I had a suspicion of it my entire life without knowing exactly what it was – knowing that there was something different about me, which I attributed to being an artist. At 11 or 12 I started sort of clarifying for myself. It took a while.
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It would seem that the Watergate story from beginning to end could be used as a primer on the American political system.
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The maddest phenomenon in this wholly mad world – that the filming or wirelessing of an event, whether it is the Grand National or an attack in force on the Maginot Line, is held to be of more importance than the event itself.
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The average voter out there understands that the next president is going to have to be prepared to immediately step in without hesitation and end our involvement in Iraq. It's very difficult to figure out how to move on to broader foreign policy concerns without fixing Iraq first.
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I played cops and robbers and pirates and all the rest when I was a kid, but I didn't want to grow up and be an actor and play cops and robbers and pirates. I wanted to grow up and be that, be cops and robbers and pirates.
