Steve Buscemi Quotes

Anything you write, even if you have to start over, is valuable. I let the story write itself through the characters.

Directing television is really hard - it's so fast. You shoot an hour show in seven days.

Trees Lounge is based on my own life. Both my parents like the movie. My father, of course, thinks it's a masterpiece.

I've had dentists who have wanted to help me out, but I say, 'You know, I won't work again if you fix my teeth.'

I think all comics borrow from each other. Only a few have an original voice, and I wasn't one of them. In the end, I couldn't figure out who to steal from, so I stopped doing it.

I like character-driven stuff. It doesn't matter, the size of the part.

I was very surprised that for a while I could only get cast as straight. It was that way for a few years.

Casting is everything. Getting the person that you imagined is this character and then seeing what they bring to it.

It's always fun to get to do independent film because I believe that that's the life blood of film. It's about writers and directors who truly have their own vision, and that's hard.

By nature, I think I am a pretty private person, and that is what is hard even doing interviews for films that I really love doing, because in some ways, it diminishes the experience that I had.

I don't think about the characters I choose to play, analytically or consciously.

I feel my life has more meaning because I am responsible for another life, although I don't have control over what Lucian - my son - is going to do. He's definitely going to carve his own way.

I didn't think I'd ever be able to do movies. That was for serious actors.

When I moved to the East Village in the late seventies, I wanted to be a street performer, so I practiced daily. I never did work up the skills or the courage to perform on the street, though.

I like the struggles that people have, people who are feeling like they don't fit into society, because I still sort of feel that way.

I read the script and decide if a particular character looks fun to play. I look for complexity and a sense of humor. Those are crucial, real things to life.

There’s something about being naïve. Really interesting things come because you don’t know what the rules are, what you can and can’t do.