28 Top James Spader Quotes You Need To Know
One of the most versatile actors in Hollywood, James Spader has made a name for himself playing eccentric and interesting characters in films such as ‘Crash’ and ‘Secretary’. The two times Golden Globe nominee actor was born and raised in Massachusetts and played his career’s first major role in the 1981 film ‘Endless Love’. His career breakthrough happened in 1989 when he played an eccentric mad man in the drama film ‘Sex, Lies and Videotape’, for which he earned unanimous praises. He went on appearing in several successful and acclaimed films such as ‘Crash’ and ‘The Watcher’. He also forged a television career with successful roles in series’ such as ‘Boston Legal’ and ‘The Blacklist’. We have compiled some of the best James Spader quotes on life, career, love, films, society, relationships, theatre and acting taken from his books, interviews and appearances on television talk shows.
I don't think movies or television have any basis in reality at all. It's all just pretend. That's what's fun about it.
The first perk of theatre is the girls.
Sometimes with people their work is the most important thing to them, and sometimes the work enables you to do other things that are more important to you. I probably am closer to that.
I think also there's no question that Lincoln has been diluted down through history in some way, almost by becoming as iconic as he is, in a way he's become diluted.
I think that Barack Obama faces a level of divisiveness, and I don't mean on a national level in terms of the North and the South and the Civil War; I really mean just politically.
If I don't need the money, I don't work.
Acting for me, is a passion, but it's also a job, and I've always approached it as such. I have a certain manual-laborist view of acting. There's no shame in taking a film because you need some money.
Love is the one emotion actors allow themselves to believe.
Working in theater, film or television are three different jobs for an actor, and I accept them as such.
I'd like to thank the academy and I'd like to thank my mother and I'd like to thank my mother again, because I forgot to thank her last year.
I lost interest in firearms because we had a dog that was scared to death of the sound of a rifle shot.
The script is the coloring book that you’re given, and your job is to figure out how to color it in. And also when and where to color outside the lines.
I've had a lazy career, sometimes one film a year, sometimes none. I'm walking around in the street and doing this other thing, living, that I'm much more interested in. I just do some acting on the side.
Acting is easy and fun. You earn a lot of money, and you bang out with girls. The profession is given tremendous significance within our society, but it's not really worthy of it.
Fear plays an interesting role in our lives. How dare we let it motivate us. How dare we let it into our decision-making, into our livelihoods, into our relationships. It's funny, isn't it? We take a day a year to dress up in costumes and celebrate fear.
If I dont need the money, I dont work. Im going to spend time with my family and friends, and Im going to travel and read and listen to music and try to learn a little bit more about how to be a human being, as opposed to learning how to be somebody else.
People who supported Obama felt like they formed a relationship, that they were being spoken to. The way that campaign worked and the way he's worked during his first term is to make people feel like he's grasping their hand, whether it's by tweeting or email, moments after an event, sometimes during an event. It makes people relate to him.
The most interesting heroes have a bit of villainy to them, and the most interesting villains have a certain bit of heroism in them. I think (Alan Shore) intends to do the right thing, but his view of the world is very different so, to get to the right place, he sometimes takes a path that goes through a very dark forest.
I look for things that are very different from my life, and that are curious and idiosyncratic to me. And then, I like to find if I'm able, just a little bit, to step into a world that I know very little about. That's great fun.
Every film you work on is different, and that's part of what it's like for anybody who works on a film, is to learn how to work with others. Learn from top to bottom. Actors have to learn how to work with the director and the director has to learn how to work with actors, and that's not just those two departments.
It's necessary to readjust and then try again. And then readjust and try again. Fathers have to do that with sons and mothers have to do that with daughters. The level of readjustment isn't quite so much when fathers are dealing with daughters and mothers are dealing with sons.
I'm not eager at all to present my life out there for public consumption. I like to do one or two films a year and then do what is absolutely obligatory in terms of promoting them. My life outside of films is vital to me.
You know, when you choose to make your living as an actor, it's all fine and good to look at it as some kind of artistic endeavor. At its best, it is that. But the fact is, most of the actors out there don't earn $3 million a picture and can't afford to take two years off between films and look for the right thing. Most of us are tradesmen.
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.
Growing up, I didn't have any comic books, at all. But my friend had a trunk full of them, so comic books were like candy for me. I would go over to his house for a sleep-over, and I would just be devouring everything I could get my hands on. I knew the sleep-over was going to be over, and I was going to go back to my house and it was going to be Kipling.
I grew up a Red Sox fan. I grew up going to Fenway Park and the Museum of Fine Arts and the Science Museum and Symphony Hall and going to the Common, walking around. My whole family at different times lived and worked in Boston.
For me, when working on a film or play or television show, everything for me starts with the screenplay and I am devoted to that and that is what I work from. Any research I do or any preparation I do on my own is all ultimately in service of that.
Acting is a great way to make a living, especially when I consider what my alternatives were and probably still are. I mean, you are only making movies. It is a lot less pressure than being a surgeon; although it seemed like the only other thing that I was qualified for was manual labour.
