Al Pacino Quotes
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One of the things that made me want to be an actor more than ever was seeing a Chekhov play, "The Sea Gull," when was 14 in the Bronx.
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I don't need bodyguards. I'm from the South Bronx.
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Playing a character is an illusion, and I feel that when you know too much about a person, possibly part of that illusion is disrupted.
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I want to be a great actor someday, and I've decided there's no use philosophizing; the only way is to work at my craft.
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Being the actors of the craft, the trade, one of the big things you do and you learn is about repeating. There is something to the repeats. I think that is part of what is healthy to young actors. Get out and learn something just through doing that, repeating.
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I've often said there's two kinds of actors. There's a more gregarious type and the shy type.
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The difference between the actor and the painter is that the actor would buy somebody a knish in order to have them watch him act.
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When I was a younger actor, I would try to keep it serious all day. But I have found, later on, that the lighter I am about things when I'm going to do a big scene that's dramatic and takes a lot out of you, the better off I am when I come to it.
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I wanted to be a baseball player, naturally, but I wasn't good enough. I didn't know what I was going to do with my life. I just had a kind of energy, I was a fairly happy kid.
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Off-Off-Broadway is absolutely necessary. It doesn't have to be sanctioned by the state, subsidized or anything. The plank and the passion is what it's about.
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[Marlon] Brando's a giant on every level. When he acts it's as if he landed from another planet. A planet where they produce great actors.
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The thing that can get you a little upset is when people say other people are better than you. That can bug you.
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Freedom, baby, is never having to say youre sorry.
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I've had very deep relationships that lasted for long periods of time with people - you could almost call them marriages, even though I didn't marry. But it was costly.
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My first language was shy. It's only by having been thrust into the limelight that I have learned to cope with my shyness.
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I don't regret anything. I feel like I've made what I would call mistakes. I picked the wrong movie, or I didn't pursue a character, but everything you do is part of you and you get something from it.
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After looking at Salomaybe, I don't know who the hell the real me is. I think it's closest now to the real me because for one thing, I'm used to this.
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We were doing Scarface many years ago...and I remember having my coffee and looking at the beach, the surf, and I saw a hundred people looking out into the ocean. I thought, what's going on? Did some whale get washed up to shore? So I stood up on the table to see what it was, and it was the director, Brian De Palma, standing there alone by the surf and they were all waiting for him. And I never forgot that because it represented to me what a director is, what a director does.
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I like, for instance, 'Serpico.' I enjoyed playing Serpico because Frank Serpico was there. He existed. He was a real life person and I could - I could embody him. I could, you know, I could work and get to know him and have him help me with the text, the script and become him. It's almost like a painter having a model to become.
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There are people whose sense of reality is very strong, who have a sense of honesty. Lee Strasberg is like that, my grandfather was like that. These are the kinds of men I've had close relationships with.
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If you have the opportunity to meet someone as an actor, it's just great fodder for you. It's wonderful source stuff that we die for.
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I' ve won awards. And they didn't make me feel bad winning them. They made me feel pretty good. But it also did not make me feel bad NOT winning the Academy Award.
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[Julie Marie Pacino]is a great ballplayer, which I wanted to be. She did make four films by the time she was 14 but we're not going to talk about that.
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The fruit falls off the tree. You don't shake it off before it's ready to fall.