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When Independent Films Break Through And Actually Make It Into Any Level Of Mainstream-ness Or Get Seen By People Or Find A Life Actually In Theaters, It's Extraordinary. And It Doesn't Happen That Often.

-Karen Allen

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When Independent Films Break

Karen Allen

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When Independent Films Break Through And Actually Make It Into Any Level Of Mainstream-ness Or Get Seen By People Or Find A Life Actually In Theaters, It's Extraordinary. And It Doesn't Happen That Often.

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If You Just Work On Your Upper Body, You're Not Going To Be A Full-range Dancer Or Performer. You've Got To Work In All Directions As Much As You Possibly Can.

My Son Was Born Somewhat Late In My Life And I Just Found Myself Really Feeling Like I Didn't Want To Miss Out On Being A Parent And Being With Him, And Not Wanting A Situation Where I Was Constantly Pulled Back And Forth Between Being Present, And Having All These Other Pressures And Considerations.

When I Was In My 20s And 30s, There Was Such A Variety And Diversity Of Types Of Films That You Could See. So Many Of Them Were Really More About The Human Condition And About Relationships Between People, And They Were Smaller Films That Had A Much Greater Impact On Me As A Human Being.

I'm About As Healthy As A Person Can Be. I Quit Smoking Seven Or Eight Years Ago.

The Secrecy Thing Has Gotten To Be More And More Prevalent In Films, And Maybe That's Good. It's Nice To Go See A Film And Not Know Anything About It. Sometimes I Feel Like We Know Too Much About Films.

I've Always Done Things The Hard Way. I Was Born Like A Piece Of Tangled Yarn. The Job Is Trying To Untangle It, And I'll Probably Go On Doing It For The Rest Of My Life.

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I've Had So Many People Just Come Up To Me And Say, 'when You Came Up On The Screen, Everybody In The Theater Applauded.' It's Just So Sweet, Really.

Eventually You Love People - Friends Or Lovers - Because Of Their Flaws.

Scripts Are Kind Of A Bare Bones Type Of Reading Material.

I Just Felt Like I Had To Create A Life For Myself Where I Was More Independent.

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I Have To Say From An Actor's Perspective, To Work With A Director Who Has Been An Actor Through Most Of Their Career Is A Pleasure. They Generally Have A Very Deep Understanding Of The Process Of What You're Doing, Of How You Are Building And Exploring The Character.

Deep Understanding

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As Actors, The Magic Is In The Almost Spiritual Experience To Really Enter Another World, To Really Enter A Belief Of Being In Another Person's Shoes And To Really Take On Their Experiences As Someone Else Has Written Them And Imagined Them. It's Kind Of A Sacred Thing. It's A Very Spiritual Experience. That In Itself For Me Is The Main Thing That Keeps Me Coming Back To It. I Like To Travel, But For Me, This Is The Greatest Travel.

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In The Theater, Actors Are The Essential Element Of The Work. In A Film, It's A Real Collaboration - Not That Theater Isn't, Because It Is - But It's A Collaboration To Such An Extent That You Can Give A Performance In Film That Sometimes You Look At And You Go, "well, That's Not The Performance I Was Trying To Give At All."

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When Independent Films Break Through And Actually Make It Into Any Level Of Mainstream-ness Or Get Seen By People Or Find A Life Actually In Theaters, It's Extraordinary. And It Doesn't Happen That Often.

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Bad Relationship

I Watch Many, Many, Many Independent Films Every Year That You See Once In A Film Festival And They're Never Heard Of Ever Again. Many Of Them Are Very, Very Good.

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There Is A Difference When You Work With Actors Who Have Worked On The Stage. When We're Out There In Front Of An Audience Eight Times A Week, You Can't Do It On Your Own.

I'm From A Generation Of Fantastic Actresses. It's A Big Pool Of Really Wonderful Actresses, And So Many Of Them We Never Even Get To See On The Screen Anymore.

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I've Never Done Anything For Money. My First Love Is Things Of Limited Commercial Appeal. I Could Be Happy Doing Shakespeare For The Rest Of My Life.

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