Spacey Quotes

Wanting people to listen, you can't just tap them on the shoulder anymore. You have to hit them with a sledgehammer, and then you'll notice you've got their strict attention. ~ Kevin Spacey

We're going to see a lot of companies that have been portals of entertainment become producers. ~ Kevin Spacey

I grew up with synthesizers and weird, spacey music-hip-hop, R&B, modern rock-that I heard on the radio. That's influenced the way I play music. It's natural for me to go with what I feel. If I didn't let that other stuff out and stuck to a certain format, I would feel like I was missing out on something. I'm just enjoying my ride and being who I am. ~ Gary Clark, Jr.

It's always the big question in our lives if you have a lot of success. What do you do with it? Buy more houses, buy more cars, buy more stuff, be wealthy and distant and unengaged? Or do you take all that good fortune that has come towards you and spread the love, do something with it? ~ Kevin Spacey

People sometimes say, "Isn't it boring, isn't it always the same? It's the same lines." I go, "Well, do you play tennis? Because that's the best analogy I can give." If you go out eight times and play tennis eight times this week, yeah it's the same rules but it's a different game every time you're out on that court.And that's the best analogy I can come up with the theater. ~ Kevin Spacey

You must find a way to express your ideas and compel your audience to react through the idea itself, and then figuring out what the best representative of that idea may be, and bringing it to life. ~ Kevin Spacey

As an actor, you're always nervous as to what a director will do with something. ~ Kevin Spacey

Clearly the success of the Netflix model, releasing the entire season of 'House of Cards' at once, proved one thing: The audience wants the control. They want the freedom. If they want to binge as they've been doing on 'House of Cards' and lots of other shows, we should let them binge. ~ Kevin Spacey

The less you know about me, the easier it is to convince you that I am that character on screen. ~ Kevin Spacey

President Obama will go down as having passed some of the most historic bills in the history of this country. ~ Kevin Spacey

Audiences grew to like this duality of feeling, where you're both championing a character and you're revolted by them. ~ Kevin Spacey

The audience wants control. They want freedom. ~ Kevin Spacey

I feel it's a responsibility for anyone who breaks through a certain ceiling ... to send the elevator back down and give others a helpful lift. ~ Kevin Spacey

I became a bit of a jerk. A kind of a nasty jerk. ~ Kevin Spacey

There are times when you do a play when you are living in the character over a two-and-a-half-hour period or longer, and you come to the end of the night, and you can feel like you were hit by a truck. ~ Kevin Spacey

If you haven't turned rebel by twenty you've got no heart; if you haven't turned establishment by thirty you've got no brains! ~ Kevin Spacey

Over a spell of about three years, I played a series of roles that were, for me, all very different, but most of them came out within a six-month period. They all dealt with a kind of dark territory that in some cases had been mined before in movies. ~ Kevin Spacey

I certainly identify with the role of mentor and, to some degree, maybe teacher. I do a lot of work with kids at the Old Vic. ~ Kevin Spacey

In film, movies' schedules are based on three things: actors' availabilities, when are sets being built, when you can rent the place you're going to film in. ~ Kevin Spacey

Give people what they want, when they want it, in the form they want it in, at a reasonable price, and they'll more likely pay for it rather than steal it. Well, some will still steal it, but I think we can take a bite out of piracy. ~ Kevin Spacey

I was terrible in my first play. After that experience, I had to face that I wasn't good enough to play with the big boys. I had to go away and learn, so I worked in regional theater for three years. I even understudied at the Kennedy Center. ~ Kevin Spacey

When I was young, I learned very early on that I could make my mother laugh. And that was one of the greatest sounds I ever heard. ~ Kevin Spacey

People don't tend to hassle me because when I've got a hat on, I look like a banker. I'm just a plain guy. ~ Kevin Spacey

At the end of the day, storytelling is actually very simple in its origin as long as there are people who want to tell stories and there are people who want to hear them. ~ Kevin Spacey

It's extremely dangerous to compare anyone else to Shakespeare. ~ Kevin Spacey

Maybe there are people who are gamers who haven't seen movies I have made, or the movies I have made have made no impression on them at all. ~ Kevin Spacey

I'm not someone who's led my life trying to get publicity; I'd rather do my work and go home. ~ Kevin Spacey

I believe this: If an actor wants a role or wants to work with somebody, then you do everything within reason to try to get that role. If they want you to audition, you audition. If they want you to screen-test, you screen-test. If they want you to come and tap-dance in their hallway, you tap-dance in their hallway. ~ Kevin Spacey

I terribly miss - we all miss, I think - somebody like the great producer Irving Thalberg. He had a foot in both camps: He understood us creative people. And he understood the money people. ~ Kevin Spacey

There's nothing like standing in a place and wanting nothing so much as to change but simply not being able to. ~ Kevin Spacey

While the sciences are hugely important, let us not leave behind a child's imagination. ~ Kevin Spacey

There are ways in which you can make sure that even if people come to the theatre because they know an actor or actress, by the end, they've forgotten that, and they leave going, 'Wow - what an amazing play.' ~ Kevin Spacey

The greatest sound in the theater is silence. ~ Kevin Spacey

I've always found it strange that a director can hire any designer he wants from any country. But if he hires a foreign actor, it's like he's stolen the crown jewels and run across the river with them. ~ Kevin Spacey

Theatre is alive and it is now, and then it's gone. ~ Kevin Spacey

Working in film tends to isolate actors - it's your close-up; it's all about you. ~ Kevin Spacey

I heard what I'd learned against my will to identify as new age music. Aimless and spacey, it meandered from unresolved keyboard chord to unresolved keyboard chord with some somnolent noodling in place of melody. Drooling pianos, music to sleepwalk by. ~ Timothy Hallinan

As long as we, in the United States, continue to insist that our politicians have to spend all of their time raising millions of dollars for television ads, it will be corrupt. If we leave it up to the politicians to clean up lobbying and finance reform, nothing is going to change. ~ Kevin Spacey

I don't want to show deleted scenes. I don't like an audience looking at what the movie might have been - if it's in the movie, it's in the movie. ~ Kevin Spacey

I'm able to hang up the character with the costume at the end of the movie. ~ Kevin Spacey

Meeting the person you are going to be playing is very unique. ~ Kevin Spacey

I love producing, I love bringing things together. ~ Kevin Spacey

Am I now supposed to go on Oprah and cry and tell you my deepest, darkest secrets because you want to know? ~ Kevin Spacey

I went through a period of great rebellion within my family, when I was about 9 or 10. I was mad, I had no focus, had no real interest in anything, and so I started to do things that were just rebellious and stupid. ~ Kevin Spacey

I remember meeting the likes of Johnny Carson and Jimmy Stewart for the first time and being completely starstruck. ~ Kevin Spacey

I believe if you go to a movie theatre, and you see something you think is incredible, if you walk out of the theatre and there was a bin in the lobby of DVDs of the film you just watched, you would buy four of them - one for you and three for your friends. ~ Kevin Spacey

Our job, you know, in the entertainment profession is to try to illuminate and show people all sides of humanity, and it doesn't just mean that you can only do movies that are only about the good parts of us. You have to be able to eliminate the bad parts. ~ Kevin Spacey

I tend to be really spacey, but I don't think it's because I'm unintelligent - it's just my imagination and a little bit of ADD. ~ Jenny Slate

It's not even about being negative. It's just being unsettled, unsatisfied, unfinished. ~ Kevin Spacey

If someone can watch an entire season of a TV series in one day, doesn't that show an incredible attention span? ~ Kevin Spacey

I have to remember if I'm at some charitable event where kids are ... I try to remember don't swear in front of the kids! ~ Kevin Spacey

Studios and networks who ignore either shift - whether the increasing sophistication of storytelling, or the constantly shifting sands of technological advancement - will be left behind, ~ Kevin Spacey

I think what we have seen in terms of gay teenagers committing suicide because of bullying is anguishing. I think young people, if they are feeling like they are confused, need to know that there are people to talk to and that there are places they can go and not feel alone. But I feel that they have just as many rights as I do to not be bullied. ~ Kevin Spacey

While data can only tell you what has happened in the past, it can in some ways give you a sense of what might be of interest to an audience in the future. ~ Kevin Spacey

When you're just able to distill it down to the idea and the feeling that a character is experiencing in a scene, it can become very, very razor sharp and really clean and really efficient and simple. And sometimes it takes twenty-five years to learn how to be simple. ~ Kevin Spacey

I can't judge the characters I play, because it's for the audience to do. What I can try to do is to understand and embody what were they going through? How did they make the decisions they made? That to me is a more interesting way to approach something, rather than saying this person is a villain and that person is this and - because it's not very interesting to play that anyway. ~ Kevin Spacey

I always remember is that no matter how good I might be in a movie, I'll never be any better. It's frozen. But in theatre I can be better tomorrow night, I can be better the night after that and I can be better in a week. The journey you go through as an actor is incredible. ~ Kevin Spacey

If we never did the things we shouldn't do, we'd never feel good about doing the things we should. ~ Francis Underwood (Kevin Spacey)

My admiration for 'Mary Tyler Moore' is very, very big because they went out on top. ~ Kevin Spacey

I don't watch rugby. ~ Kevin Spacey

If you look back through history in the United States, there have been very few landslide elections. Half the country always voted for someone else. ~ Kevin Spacey

It's the kind of democratization of the Internet that has led to the breaking down of barriers into the creative arts. ~ Kevin Spacey

It's not easy to sustain a long career, and sometimes I don't even think about how long I've been doing it. ~ Kevin Spacey

I guess I've been training in the theater for as long as I can remember. ~ Kevin Spacey

I can't imagine that anyone in Hollywood is sitting around trying to decide what actor is good or right or qualified for a role and is being denied a role because of their political views. I don't think that's the way Hollywood works. We're not living in an era of blacklisting. ~ Kevin Spacey

We've learned the lesson that the music industry didn't learn: give people what they want, when they want it, in the form they want it in, at a reasonable price, and they'll more likely pay for it rather than steal it. ~ Kevin Spacey

Mediocrity is the elephant in the room. ~ Kevin Spacey

Whether that's positive or not, people are talking about the Old Vic Theater again with passion and commitment and controversy and debate. ~ Kevin Spacey

The movies are not my first priority - the theater is. ~ Kevin Spacey

Life's all about perceptions. ~ Kevin Spacey

I'm aware that, from the outside, this looks like I've got quite an ego. ~ Kevin Spacey

I'm not going to make general comments about the British press. ~ Kevin Spacey

I really like the Doors. I like Kevin Spacey, Bruce Springsteen, Will Farrell, Reggie Watts, Tina Turner, who is also very hot, Tracy Chapman. Beethoven. ~ Flula Borg

Essentially, your voice is an instrument; it's a muscle, and you have to treat it like a muscle, and so you have to work it. ~ Kevin Spacey

Have we become so celebrity-obsessed that there is no longer a difference between a character and an actor? I hope not. ~ Kevin Spacey

[Washington, DC] feels like you're watching performance art. A lot of the time. I don't believe them, I don't believe what they say, I don't think they're being absolutely sincere. I think it's performance art. And most of them are bad actors. ~ Kevin Spacey

I find it sad that by not talking about who I sleep with, that makes me mysterious. There was a time when I would have been called a gentleman. ~ Kevin Spacey

To me, getting up every single night and trying to reach out to an audience, and trying to dig deeper and further in the play to serve the writer and to understand yourself in that context is how you continue to grow and learn. ~ Kevin Spacey

I don't live a lie. You have to understand that people who choose not to discuss their personal lives are not living a lie. That is a presumption that people jump to. ~ Kevin Spacey

People think that direct address was invented by Ferris Bueller, but in fact, it wasn't. It was invented by Shakespeare. ~ Kevin Spacey

I want to bring theatre to a new generation, using the tools available to us, including taking it out to them on film and with new technology, but that is just so they can discover theatre. I want them to come in and sit in a theatre. This is the way to plant seeds. ~ Kevin Spacey

I love doing impressions. ~ Kevin Spacey

When the story is good enough, people can watch something three times the length of an opera. ~ Kevin Spacey

You just play what a writer writes, in terms of what a character chooses to do and how a character chooses to deal with their various relationships. ~ Kevin Spacey

I think you need the failures to get the success. You learn more from that. ~ Kevin Spacey

I'm supposed to convince you, for two hours, that I'm somebody else. Now if you know everything about my life, if you think you've got me figured out and you think you know all my dark secrets, how am I ever going to convince you that I'm somebody else? ~ Kevin Spacey

The thing that is always so surprising about plays written in another century is how remarkably elastic they are. When you listen to the way in which Shakespeare attacks relationships, for example, even though the words may start off sounding foreign, in actuality they are so accessible, the motivations so clear, the resonances so contemporary. When you put it in a modern context - we could well be in a place with someone like Gaddafi or Mubarak - it becomes apparent how Richard III resonates with that type of personality, with media and manipulation, alliances and petty jealousies. ~ Kevin Spacey

If you're lucky enough to do well, it's your responsibility to send the elevator back down. ~ Kevin Spacey

I think that there is no doubt that every experience you have in your life, whether it's playing a character or something else, you bring that to the work. ~ Kevin Spacey

Fundamentally, I like to accomplish things. ~ Kevin Spacey

I often make the analogy with tennis. Every match the rules are the same, but no game is ever the same. Theatre is like that. Every time is different. ~ Kevin Spacey

I don't even think in terms of ambition. ~ Kevin Spacey

No one should ever feel sorry for me. I've been treated very well for the most part. ~ Kevin Spacey

What I do is interpret, not create. I may add elements and do something different. That is what is so incredible about theatre. Why do we love it that there are nine Hamletsor six King Lears over two years? We love to watch a different actor attack the same material. ~ Kevin Spacey

I've never heard of a situation where, because somebody had a particular political belief, they didn't get a part. I think it's a bit of a myth. ~ Kevin Spacey

The legal profession, politics and acting are very closely tied: the whole point is to have an idea and get it across to a listener, whether it is one person or five thousand in a hall. ~ Kevin Spacey

Netflix did it right and focused on all the things that have replaced the dumb, raw numbers of the Nielsen world - they embraced targeted marketing and 'brand' as a virtue higher than ratings. ~ Kevin Spacey

Edward Norton and I have known each other awhile. I just think he's the real deal, supremely talented and smart. He's got a great sense of humor. ~ Kevin Spacey

But I feel that I have a responsibility to help the film and I have relations with the studio and with those who put up the money so that I can tell a story that I believe in. ~ Kevin Spacey

It's a really wonderful thing to focus your life on something other than your own personal career and ambition. ~ Kevin Spacey