Your scene precariously subsists too long,
On French translation and Italian song.
Dare to have sense yourselves; read more

Your scene precariously subsists too long,
On French translation and Italian song.
Dare to have sense yourselves; assert the stage;
Be justly warm'd with your own native rage.

Like hungry guests, a sitting audience looks;
Plays are like suppers; poets are the cooks.
The founder's read more

Like hungry guests, a sitting audience looks;
Plays are like suppers; poets are the cooks.
The founder's you: the table is the place:
The carvers we: the prologue is the grace.
Each act, a course, each scene, a different dish,
Though we're in Lent, I doubt you're still for flesh.
Satire's the sauce, high-season'd, sharp and rough.
Kind masks and beaux, I hope you're pepperproof?
Wit is the wine; but 'tis so scarce the true
Poets, like vintners, balderdash and brew.
Your surly scenes, where rant and bloodshed join.
Are butcher's meat, a battle's sirloin:
Your scenes of love, so flowing, soft and chaste,
Are water-gruel without salt or taste.

As good as a play.

As good as a play.

And Tragedy should blush as much to stoop
To the low mimic follies of a farce,
As read more

And Tragedy should blush as much to stoop
To the low mimic follies of a farce,
As a grave matron would to dance with girls.

Acting is a question of absorbing other people's personalities and adding some of your own experience.

Acting is a question of absorbing other people's personalities and adding some of your own experience.

The point of acting is to pretend you're someone else and sell a story.

The point of acting is to pretend you're someone else and sell a story.

The drama's laws, the drama's patrons give.
For we that live to please, must please to live.

The drama's laws, the drama's patrons give.
For we that live to please, must please to live.

I’ve been offered a lot but I want to stay away from romance, comedies and fluffy work. I met Stephen read more

I’ve been offered a lot but I want to stay away from romance, comedies and fluffy work. I met Stephen Spielberg at a breast cancer benefit and he explained that he’d seen me on Saturday Night Live and thought I was ready for a movie. He said, ‘You go to the ledge and are unafraid to jump off.’ That was the biggest compliment to me because he was saying I was free.

My only regret in the theatre is that I could never sit out front
and watch me.

My only regret in the theatre is that I could never sit out front
and watch me.