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The Tragic Element Of A Character Is Always Intriguing I Think.

-Greg Kinnear

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The Tragic Element Of

Greg Kinnear

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The Tragic Element Of A Character Is Always Intriguing I Think.

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You Don't Get To Pick Your Partners In Families; You Get Assigned A Seat At The Table.

Setting Goals Can Blind You To Opportunities. You Might Be Trying To Get To Point C. When Opportunity B Comes, You Don't Even Look At It Because You're Going Straight To C.

Everybody's Family Has Problems.

If A Woman Has One Cat, It Will Invariably Turn Into 20.

Of Course, Actors Look Forward To The Day When They Can Do A Big Courtroom Scene.

I Went Door-to-door Selling Cable Television Subscriptions When I Was In College. I Found It Incredibly Difficult, Doing That Kind Of Sales Work. I Would Have Thought I'd Be Good At It, But I Wasn't. It's So Easy In Acting. Everything Falls Into Place When They Write That You're A Salesman. People Just Say Yes, And Then It's Great.

Well, I Don't Know What Image People Have Of Me.

I Don't Think There's Any Connection Between My Journalism Career And My Film Career. They Are Two Totally Different Mediums And Very Different Skills.

You Learn More About A Person From The People Around That Person Than You Do From The Person Themselves. We All Have Our Own Ideas Of Who We Are That May Or May Not Be Justified, And You Can Really Find Out A Heck Of A Lot More Accurately From The People Around An Individual.

My Family Moved - First To Washington, D.c., And Then, In The Spring Of 1975, To Lebanon, Where My Father Worked As A Diplomat At The American Embassy. My Parents Were Enthusiastic About The Move, So My Older Brother And I Felt Like We Were Off To Some Place Kind Of Cool.

Here's The Thing About Movies, All Movies End Up On Television. That's Their Life. Whether You Like It Or Not, I Don't Care How Much Money You Spend On It, Or How Big Or Broad The Film Is, Or Who The Actors Are In It, Eventually It's All Coming Out Of The Box.

Cat Lovers Turn Into Cat Collectors.

A Man Always Looks Good In A Dark Suit.

I'm Very Leery Of Show Business, Having Been In Los Angeles For The Last 10 Years. Buzz Is A Dangerous Thing That I've Heard Applied To A Lot Of People That I've Since Not Heard Of Again.

I Was Just A Quiet Kid, Really. I Wasn't The Class Clown At All.

I Don't Consider A Lot Of Actors That I Really Admire Movie Stars.

Part Of Filmmaking Is Always A Guessing Game, And Part Of It Is Always A Game Of Trust.

Same Job, Whether It's Comedy Or Drama. Regardless Of The Weight Of The Role, I Feel Like The Job Is Always Kind Of The Same. Who Is This Person? What's This Guy Here, And How Is He Playing With This Thing, And What's He Trying To Say? And What's The Volley With All These Other People Around Him?

I Really Don't Make A Concerted Effort To Try To Find A Type Of Role. Maybe I've Just Done Enough Of Them Now Where People Are Like, "oh, It's The Guy That's In A Swirling Vortex Of Despair, Send It To Kinnear!" I Don't Really Know, But It Does Seem To Be A Recurring Theme.

Jack Nicholson Is Fairly Gifted. We Were At The Sistine Chapel, And Everybody Went From Looking Straight Up To Looking Across The Room At Him.

When I Was A Kid, I Was Obsessed With This Idea Of Opening A Restaurant Back In Indiana On A Little Pond. The Guests Would Order Their Dinner And Then Take A Little Boat Out With A Colored Flag On The Front Of It. When The Matching Color Of The Flag On Their Boat Went Up On A Flag Pole, Their Dinner Was Ready!

I Like Complicated Characters.

Most Actors Are Very Deeply Passionate About Their Line Of Work. I Suppose There Are Probably People Who Sell Insurance Policies That Are Passionate About It, But I'm Thinking The Ratio Is A Little Higher For Actors. But, I May Be Wrong.

I Had Interest In Acting. I Started As A Drama Major In College. I Got To School And Said, "what Am I Going To Do With This?" But I Didn't Know Anybody In The Business, And It Seemed Like - I Don't Know. I Had A Teacher Who Said "less Than 1 Percent Of You Will Ever Make A Living Being An Actor." That Was How We Opened The Semester.

Ultimately, I'm Not So Sure That, As A Person, I'm All That Interesting.

I Was A Halfback On An American Football Team In Athens, Greece - The Kississia Colts - Where I Went To High School, And We Took The Cup My Senior Year. The Downside, And Somewhat Unfortunate Piece Of Information I Have To Pass On, Is There Were Only Two Teams In The League Because Of The Limited Amount Of Americans.

I Was 12 When My Parents Told Me We Were Moving To Lebanon. I Remember Thinking, 'leba-who?' I Had Absolutely No Concept Of The Place.

I'm A Terrible Procrastinator. When We Go To The Airport, If They're Not Literally Closing The Door Behind My Sweaty, Hyperventilating Body, I Feel I've Been There Too Long.

I've Always Thought Mexico City Was Incredibly Dynamic.

Regardless Of The Weight Of The Role, I Feel Like The Job Is Always Kind Of The Same. Who Is This Person? What's This Guy Here, What's He Trying To Say? And What's The Volley With All These Other People Around Him? So I Don't Feel Like That Part Of It Changes. I Have Not Reached The Point - If There's A Point You Reach As An Actor Where It's, "oh, I Got This Figured Out, I Know How To Do This". But I Am Happy To Say That The Primary Building Blocks Of Where You Start, At Least, There Is A Little Bit Of Sameness To That. And That's Always Nice.

The Irony Is That You Can't Use Real Rain To Make Movies.

Whenever Hollywood Gets Involved With Real Life Events, Certain Liberties Have To Be Taken.

There's Something In Human Nature, The Trying-to-get-on-with-it Quality Of People, The Struggle To Maintain Or Keep The Show Going Can Be Exhausting.

There's No Harmony In Most People In A Way, And I'm Attracted To It, And I Think It Makes For Good Storytelling.

I'm Happy To Report That Everybody Whose Face I've Wanted To Punch On Earth Has Already Been Punched.

I Really Don't Make A Concerted Effort To Try To Find A Type Of Role.

I Went Door-to-door Selling Cable Television Subscriptions When I Was In College. Not To Date Myself, But Cable Was Just Coming On. I Had Terrible Territories, And They Would Give Me $25, If I Got Somebody To Let Them Come And Just Put The Little Cord In Their House.

There Is A Gambling Element To Being Somebody Who Is Going To Take On The Job Of Constantly Trying To Represent And Prop Up People Who Might Be Somewhat Shady. That Notion Is Probably Part Of How They Got The Rap. But, I Have To Find The Balance Of Being Colorful, Being At Times Despicable, And Also Being Somebody Who Does Believe In Something.

The Tragic Element Of A Character Is Always Intriguing I Think.

There's Times When I'll See A Show, Or Something Cooking On Tv, And Think, "that Can Really Be Fun When It's Working." But It's A Grind. I Did That At Nbc, It Was Five Days A Week. I Was Doing Talk Soup And Later At The Same Time. It's A Hard Job, More Difficult Than People Realize.

I've Never Had A Clear Road Map. When Things Come Along, I Benefit.

In My Sophomore Year, A Kid Told Me That The Secret To Getting Women Is To Play Really, Really Hard To Get. I Followed His Advice, And I Didn't Have So Much As A Date That Year.

It's Not Easy To Tell A Story About Writers And Make That Feel Like A Complete Story And An Interesting Story.

I Was Always Explaining Why My Term Papers Were Never On Time. I Think That's Where I Got My Acting Training!

Talking About Corporations - They're So Big. There's Not A Person At A Corporation.

I Have Always Been Interested In The Concept Of Ruin.

I Find Fear Is A Great Motivator To Work Hard.

I Do Give A Great Deal Of Forethought And Zone In On Character And All Sorts Of Things Like That. Never Before Have I Just Stuffed Something Away In The Back Cupboard Of My Brain Because It Was Just Such A Crazy Concept.

Audiences Don't Ever Disappoint Me, In The Sense That Movies I Feel Really Good About, They Usually Feel Really Good About Too.

She Is Such A Scene-stealer. She's Got These Lashes And Big Eyes, And When She Walks On To The Set Everybody Just Says "ooh."

When I Look Back On My Childhood, I Think Of That Short Time In Beirut. I Know That Seeing The City Collapse Around Me Forced Me To Grasp Something Many People Miss: The Fragility Of Peace.

There's Something In Human Nature, The Trying-to-get-on-with-it Quality Of People, The Struggle To Maintain Or Keep The Show Going Can Be Exhausting. It Just Seems Like That Element Of Trying To Move Forward While Things Are Breaking Down... Obviously, It's Always Been The Backdrop For A Lot Of Great Literature And Great Cinematic Characters, But Aside From That, I'm Just Drawn To It Because That Feels Honest To Me.

My Adolescence Was All Tits And Champagne. I'm Downplaying The Magic Of It All.

Cher's Great, She's Incredible. She Is An Enormous, Enormous Star, Who Goes Anywhere And Crowds Follow Her...and Yet She's A Disciplined Actress And She's Down To Earth And Cool. I Can't Say Enough Good Things About Her.

Let's Keep The Chemists Over Here And The Food Over Here, That's My Feeling. What Do I Know? But That Is A Big Aspect Of Fast Food Is Their Ability To Artificially Taint The Colors And The Smells And Stuff To Stimulate Appetite.

If You're Working On A Movie, You Want It To Be Projected On The Largest Tapestry Possible, And The Sound To Be Perfect, And For That Kind Of Communal Experience Of The Movies To Take Place For It.

The Automotive Corporations, Including Ford, I Think Are In The Business Of Trying To Make Cars That People Will Drive.

I Can't Not Find Humor In Elements Of Most Parts Of Life, But At The Same Time Nothing Ever Seems Perpetually Funny To Me.

We All Have To Lead Double Lives, Not Just Celebrities. The Face We Put On Publicly With Our Jobs And Certain Situations. I Think That's Part Of The Human Condition.

I've Never Felt Like My Career Has Been On Fire.

When You Have A Director Who Has Work You Can Identify From The Past, It Gives You Some Reference Point As To What Their Interpretation Of The Story Might Be, And How That Might Jibe, Right Or Wrong, With How You See It. But With A First-time Director, You Don't Really Know Where You're At.

Sometimes I Look Back And Think, 'good. I'd Love To Go In And Bang Out A Good Episode Of 'talk Soup' Today.'

I Have A Very Well Organized Closet.

Good Scripts And Interesting Stories Are Hard Enough To Find.

'little Miss Sunshine' Was One Of Those Small Movies That You Don't Hold Out Huge Hope For. It's Usually Found In Small Pockets. But, It Ended Up Getting A Real Following And Worked Out Pretty Well.

My Grandfather Had Two Boys, My Uncle Had Three Boys, My Dad Had Me And My Two Brothers, Each Of My Brothers Have Had Two Boys. Then Something Happened With The Chromosomal Experiment And Suddenly I've Got Three Girls.

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