William H. Macy Quotes

You can skim those stage directions and go right to the dialogue. You can almost read the movie in the same amount of time it will take you to see the movie.

I'm sure I have a process, but it mostly takes place in my dreams.

I introduced myself to Scorsese and I said, "If you need someone to do craft services, I'm there."

I have a tendency to say yes to a script or no to a script. Not yes based on a rewrite.

Talk about putting your money where your mouth is. It's not right. Someone's gotta say it. They said it. I applaud them.

So many actors spend so much energy trying to remember the lines. It's so foolish. Guys are the worst.

I've written a lot of scripts that someone else directed, and it's absolutely vital that, if I'm gonna act in it, then I have to take off the writer hat and let the director direct.

I think theater is powerful. The best experiences I had in the theater are more powerful than the best experiences I had in movies.

I'm not religious. It's an issue, 'cause I've got two little kids, and I feel you can't grow up without knowledge of religion.

What actors are good at doing is walking into a situation that should make you incredibly self-conscious and frightened and doing it anyway. That's the gig, pretending that you are comfortable.

We all want to be 20 again and have that first sense of love.

We must admit that it is quite common that people do have affairs with their leading ladies and men.

Somebody's gotta stand up and say pubic hair is good, murder is bad. Sex is good, violence is bad.

I'm not much of a preparer. I think sometimes as an actor you need to go out and learn some skills, but in terms of preparation for understanding the character, it's all on the page, and if it's not on the page, you're in trouble.

That red carpet has to be felt to be believed.

I got an agent. He said, what do you wanna do, and I said, I want an Oscar nomination. That's your job, that's what I'm paying you for. And I got it.

Before I made it big I worked as a dishwasher, washing dishes in this place called Dishwasher House where people could just come in and do whatever they wanted to the dishes and we had to clean them with our hands till they bled. A lot of struggling actors worked there-Downey Jr., Joaquin Phoenix, Damon Wayans, Marlon Wayans, Keenen Ivory Wayans-and we actually all kind of wish we still did.

Yeah, I made it. It sneaks up on you. You're some schmuck and you wake up one day and you go, Good God, I'm the cheese.

It's a shame ... you just don't see young people doing anything outside these days.

I'm not against watching myself, but I miss a lot of it. I've got two little kids who we don't let watch TV.

I think I've been in situations where they looked at me and just see some rich white guy - they don't see me at all.

We thought sex was free. Sex is not free. There's a price to be paid emotionally, physically, even legally. Sex isn't a casual thing. It's a huge thing.

I've got two little girls, I'm not scared about sex. I'll teach them, it's not going to kill them. But what could kill them is violence. Guns, drinking and driving, these are the real dangers in our society.

There are some older women out there who are just knockouts, real beauties, and they're not getting the roles they should.

I've always felt it's the directors purview to say what; it's the actor's purview to say how. It's not good for an actor to have the big picture in mind - it bollocks you up. An actor's purview is the tiny little ... We measure our performance in seconds.

The Spirit Awards are great too, they'll say anything because they're not televised. Another great drinking night.

A favorite cast? Lisa Kudrow, Anthony Hopkins, Gene Hackman, Morgan Freeman, and my wife.

Ninety percent of the preparation we do as actors is just jive. It doesn't do anything.

Shameless is a rough show, and it's not for everyone, but it's also beautiful.

We always want to see people strive and see the human spirit triumph against adversity. That's what it's all about because that's what we're doing. We're trying to triumph in our lives.

I love metaphor the way some people love junk food.

Directors work 10 times harder than anyone else. Get paid a quarter.

Anyway, I try to be a good guy. I try to tell the truth, but I'm not religious.

It's hard to be depressed around a ukulele. You just pick it up and you're halfway home.

Oh yeah, that's the Holy Grail, Pirates of the Caribbean. Johnny Depp, he's the real deal, isn't he? He doesn't get the girl, and he doesn't care.

Nobody became an actor because he had a good childhood.

I'll tell you this about the Oscars - they're real.

Writers love to write those idiotic, long stage directions, and some of them worse than others. They have nothing to do with the movie. They're just jerking around.

I don't watch rushes. My whole thing is to try to stay in the moment with the other actor, and to let it all hang. I'm not sure I'm right on that, though.

I was a dog in a past life. Really. I'll be walking down the street and dogs will do a sort of double take. Like, Hey, I know him.

I do them all for the money, I really do.