| # | Quote |
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| 1 | [on being directed by Jason Reitman in Labor Day (2013)] For me, with a drama like this that's so laconic in its behavior, I kind of made an ass of myself on the set. A lot of Jason's direction was, 'Please stop moving and fucking around'. |
| 2 | For twenty years I worked with a lot of people with not a massive amount of talent. And there was always ego, always fights. Working with the Coens - just kicking back a couch and watching them edit - they have two desks that are perpendicular, and Ethan is picking the best takes, and Joel is on the other desk, and when Ethan hits a bell - bing! - Joel looks up and he brings down the take and puts it in. I mean, it's such a simple, amazing process to watch. |
| 3 | [on trying out for a part he didn't get] I did an audition for The Fly II (1989). I was living in New York at the time, and I went in there, and he's in a cocoon, transforming into a fly. So I walked in and started reading. You do the voice and you're like [choking sounds] you know, doing your thing. And I ended up on the floor, frothing at the mouth. I got back to my apartment and there was already a message on the machine from my agent that said, 'What the fuck did you do in there? You scared them'. |
| 4 | [on Paul Thomas Anderson's directing style] It's like, Let's go this way, or Let's whisper the lines, and Let's actually take out all the lines and we'll do it like charades once. Or, You know, like hold him - put him on your shoulders and let's do the whole scene like that. He's all over the place. It's just absolute fucking chaos every day, all day. Which is great, 'cause you feel like you've done something. |
| 5 | [on his career, 2012] I like it right now, because I don't feel I've sold out. I feel good about the characters I'm playing and the movies I'm in. I've turned down a lot of 'event' films over the years. Money's neat, money's fun and when somebody's holding out their hands [full of cash], saying 'You want some? You want some?',there's a little bit of withdrawal when you say 'No'. |
| 6 | [on being directed to imitate Tommy Lee Jones in Men in Black 3 (2012)] Tommy's voice is like an elusive instrument somebody made up and nobody knows how to play. I never felt I nailed it. |
| 7 | (2009) I would fucking wrack my brain like crazy trying to figure out which films I wanted to be in. Is this going to be good? Is this the right filmmaker? What other actors are involved? Where does it shoot? I'd ask myself all these questions rather then follow my instincts. There shouldn't be so many factors. Decisions should be based on two things: great script, great director. Period. |
| 8 | (2009) I have to tell you, you can't have an ego when you're an actor. A lot of actors have them, but in reality most of those people are just sensitive artists dying for a hug and a compliment. |
| 9 | (On the armpit licking scene in Flirting with Disaster (1996)) Okay, so Patricia (Patricia Arquette) and I, we had known each other sort of loosely before. Anyway, we were doing this scene the way the scene was written: We kissed and then Ben Stiller's character walks into the room and says, "What are you doing? How are you doing this?" But we saw it and it was boring. So I said, "Well, what if my character had a foot fetish? What if he was sucking on her big toe? He could be talking about her big toe and how beautiful big toes are and how beautiful feet are". But the director, David O. Russell, was like, "Uh . . . I don't know". So then Patricia said, "What about the armpit?" And David says, "Yeah, yeah, that's great". But I was like, "I don't know, man", because I'm thinking, I've got to lick the armpit. And Patricia goes, "Yeah, you could just lick my armpit", and she lifted her arm and, I guess because that's how she saw the character, she had grown out all her underarm hair. Then I had, like, a severe reaction. I said, "No! I don't like that idea. I really like the foot idea. Or maybe we could go with the small of her back. But the underarm thing, I don't think it's proper. It seems a little disgusting to me". Anyway, they were already on it, that it was working. So we shot it and I had to lick her armpit with the hair. Anyway, we saw the footage, and it was so disgusting that David said, "We can't have the hair. Patricia has to shave the hair". So what you see in the film is the third attempt at making that scene playable. |
| 10 | (1996, on landing Flirting with Disaster (1996)) I was living in New York at the time and hanging out with this guy in Los Angeles. I was helping him with his audition (for the part of "Tony" in Flirting with Disaster (1996)) and I ended up falling in love with the script and the character of "Tony" as well. To make a long story short - I ended up getting the part I was helping him get. Sorry to say I haven't seen him since. |
| 11 | (On some film choices prior to No Country for Old Men (2007)) It was a whole fucking exhausting process to even get the parts I got. I had to fight to get this movie Into the Blue (2005) so Dean Cain wouldn't get it. "I'm Josh Brolin, man", but the studio was like, "Goonies was 20 years ago. We want Dean Cain". Nothing against Dean, a smart guy who knows a lot of people, but they wanted him instead of me because of what? So I get the movie, but the director didn't appreciate that I ask a lot of questions, that I want to try to tweak things, so it was, "Whatever, man, do whatever you're going to do. We should have gotten Dean Cain". |
| 12 | (On hosting Saturday Night Live (1975)) For years, I'd thought about that show - could I actually do it - but then you do it and realize everybody's up all night writing the thing and you're given 60 scripts. You sit around a table trying to be good, but the more you want to be good the worse you are. A great experience but really, really tough. |
| 13 | (2010) I remember saying no when a TV network wanted to give me a holding fee while it came up with another show for me. I got so much shit from my agent, everybody, including my family. Why are you turning this down? Who do you think you are? I'd just go off and hang out with my kids more or go do theater, which I liked but which didn't pay anything. I've heard "Who do you think you are?" so many times in my career for the sole reason that I just didn't want to do what somebody else thought I should do. |
| 14 | (2010 - on getting into trading) I was always good with numbers. Around 2005 I had to sell the ranch, which was sad. I had done a little part in a Steven Spielberg miniseries called Into the West (2005) and met a real financial expert, Brett Markinson, on a plane trip, and we talked the whole time about stock trading. On his advice, I put some of the profit from the sale of the ranch into secured investments, apartments, and the rest, I traded. I read every book there was to read on the subject. I was willing to ask a million questions. Brett liked that I was willing to listen and that I knew he had something to offer as a great teacher. From 5:30 a.m. every day, I'd be pinging him, saying, "I'm looking at this graph. What do think about this stock?" He'd say, "Why would you pick that stock, you fucking moron?" and he'd explain things. Finally, something clicked. I realized that a majority of the experts, Brett expected, had no idea what they were doing and only followed the market trends. I found you can hit pretty much every time or you've overlooked something. It taught me absolute, total discipline. You have to be okay with wins and losses. You can't just be looking for the wins and, when the losses happen, you can't buy more and more because you're sure it's going to bounce. We call that revenge trading. |
| 15 | I'm a huge Donald Trump fan. I love who he is, what he's about. He's hated like any other celebrity is-like he's got the comb-over, he's an asshole, he's a capitalist, and capitalism is bad, right? I've met billionaires whose spirit is so dirty, their souls are so soot, shit and muck that it was mind-blowing to be in their presence. But that's not Donald Trump. People think I'm a left, left, left-leaning Democrat, but I'm a very conservative Democrat, more libertarian than anything. |
| 16 | (2010 - on doing romantic comedies) I wouldn't know how to do it. I don't like the genre, and comedies are not fun to do. Everybody on the set gets so serious trying to figure out how to make the timing and jokes right. Ryan Reynolds is one guy who I think nobody can do that better than, and he doesn't get any fucking credit for it. I went back to see him three times in The Proposal (2000). I'm so gay. |
| 17 | (On his school years) I got picked on a lot. I was a complete geek in school. I had braces. I didn't have the hot girlfriend. I wasn't ever sought after. I was a stocky, awkward kid who got laughed off the tennis court when I tried that. Football? Forget it. I didn't have that thing inside me where I wanted to smash against somebody and watch them break. I was too sensitive for that and disliked being that sensitive. |
| 18 | (2010) I only took a high school acting class because there was no other class I wanted to take. I loved it, but I was always against acting as a profession. I didn't like the monetary fluctuations I saw. |
| 19 | (On landing The Goonies (1985)) This agent started sending me out, but I was so bad, I was told I probably shouldn't do this and that just because my dad was an actor didn't mean I was going to make it. It was horrible. On probably the 300th interview, this thing happened with Richard Donner and Steven Spielberg. |
| 20 | (On his movie Thrashin' (1986)) I was so terrible in it. That was one of the movie experiences - along with Hollow Man (2000), a lot of years later - that made me question whether I should be doing something else. I don't want to watch myself in something like that. It's a travesty. |
| 21 | (On auditioning for 21 Jump Street (1987)) I wanted any job at that point. They had fired the initial guy and auditioned three other guys, and it came down to Johnny Depp and me. The network wanted me, the producer wanted Johnny. He and I were at his apartment hanging out; our girlfriends were best friends at the time. Johnny had just finished a small part in Platoon (1986) and was talking about what it meant for him to work for this great director, Oliver Stone. The phone rings, it's Johnny's agent. He listens, hangs up, stuffs his clothes into his "Platoon" duffel and just walks out. The next time I saw him, I was doing a guest role on the fourth episode of 21 Jump Street (1987). |
| 22 | [on portraying President George W. Bush] When [Oliver Stone] came to me, I was a little insulted. I had such a visceral reaction against it. But then I read the script and I thought it was amazing. I didn't love the story but as a character - following a guy from 21 to 58 - was an incredible challenge for an actor. |
| 23 | On playing George W. Bush: Why me? Why would I want to do this movie? "Why would I want to do this to my career? |
| 24 | (On landing No Country for Old Men (2007)) The Coen Brothers didn't pitch the project to me, actually. I had read the book first without knowing that there was a movie being made. My agent actually called me and said they were making "No Country" and explained the script to me and said, "No, no. I read the book". She sent me a couple of scenes and then I said, "I can't get out of work". I was working with Robert Rodriguez on Grindhouse (2007) and Robert and Quentin Tarantino helped put me on tape as an audition tape and sent that to the Coens. They were smitten with the lighting and not so much for me. So that was a no. It was only through my agent, Michael Cooper, who is my good friend and a great agent. He's an old time agent; there are few and far between that actually care about their clients. He kept telling Ethan Coen, 'Just meet him. I'm not going to tell you he's the one but I'm going to tell you to just meet him'. I met them on what I found out later was their last casting call and then I got the part. |
| 25 | (On his love of the stock market - 2007) I love the competitive part of stocks. A lot of fear and greed, that's all it is. All I see is green and red. |
| 26 | (On Mister Sterling (2003)) I'm so glad that show didn't go, because it was more work then I ever wanna do again, and I love film. |
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