I write plays instinctively. I don't like writing movie scripts.
— Jesse Eisenberg
I felt self-conscious going out in the street prior to ever even being in a movie. That's just me.
As for environmentalism, I'm only an environmentalist by accident. I live in New York, so I bike, and the closest grocery store to me sells organic produce. I also shop with a book bag because I ride a bike, and it's hard to carry the paper or plastic bags.
I always think the second worst thing in the world is to go on stage at night, and the first worst thing in the world is sitting at home at night. For me, it's scarier to not be doing it than doing it.
The only suggestions I get on my plays is to make them more of what they already are, and that's wonderful.
Any time you play a character for a long period of time, regardless of how close it is to you, it infiltrates your life. It's impossible for it not to.
It's a struggle for me to watch things I've been in because I'm just distracted and self-critical.
It's really hard to copy another actor and be successful. In fact, that's usually the reason people are not good, because they're copying something they've seen, but, for some reason with their face and their body, it doesn't work.
I feel very guilty doing magic because you're deceiving somebody.
I'm not on Page Six, because I don't have anything salacious happening in my life... unfortunately.
Acting forces me to socialise, which is good for me, I think.
I often think if you have time to sit around the house feeling bad for yourself, you have time to tutor a child. I'm guilty of that exact thing. I will spend more time sitting around feeling bad for myself than actually helping somebody.
I did children's theater when I was younger, and then when I was about 14 I started doing theater in New York City.
I'm no good at really anything that involves motor skills.
It's very hard to be a playwright because it's very competitive.
Everyone's a geek in some way or other. Everyone's an outsider.
I find people who want to help other people to be the most interesting. I come from a family of teachers, and my friends are teachers, often times in very difficult school situations.
I write all the time because I'm lonely. When you're acting, you're working every day all day. But then you have long amounts of time off.
I think the most important thing for an actor is reading the script and trying to figure out if you can play that character well. The last thing on my mind is if the director made good movies previously. It's not my job to know if that director's last movie was any good - it's my job to know if I can play the role.
I feel equal parts lucky and scared anytime I get a job.
I don't concern myself with thinking ahead to the finished product. I focus more specifically on what the character is experiencing. Once you relieve yourself of the very arbitrary and always punishing pressure of what an audience is expecting you to do, acting becomes a lot more fun and pure.
The only way to be turned off to being famous is to be famous.
I made the mistake of writing something very, very short about Obama for this website that I write fiction for, and my father told me never do that again. And he was right. I have nothing to add to a political conversation because it's not my area.
My feeling is... when you show up to a movie set where there's, like, 50 people standing around and months of preparation gone into it, you want to be as prepared as possible, so you should make a million baguettes. That might not actually help in any explicit way, but it'll make you feel more prepared.
My job when I'm acting in a movie is very limited to playing a role. I'm not evaluating somebody. I'm only evaluating them insofar as they're interacting with me, but I'm not evaluating their skill set and I don't watch the movies, so I'm not aware of the way they're putting things together.
The ideal way to approach a character is to find something in yourself that relates in some way.
Acting is a weird, kind of alienating job because you're in an isolated place. Even if you're working with a lot of other people, you're kind of alienated. Actors say that a lot, and I kind of find that to be true.
I have an iPad and I watch three things: 'The Daily Show,' '60 Minutes,' and 'Meet the Press.'
I always thought Woody Harrelson is quite a persuasive guy. He's the kind of guy who can call you up in the middle of the night and tell you, 'Let's all go get a donut!' And you're thinking, 'It's the middle of the night,' but somehow you still get up and go get a donut.
Mother Teresa was asked what was the meaning of life, and she said to help other people, and I thought, 'What a strange thing to say' - but maybe it's the right thing to say.
I have one female fan. But she lives with me. I'm not aware of any others.
In New York, everybody is their own celebrity, so they're not so interested in other people.
I grew up in a secular suburban Jewish household where we only observed the religion on very specific times like a funeral or a Bar Mitzvah.
The scariest people to turn a movie over to are always the people who are drawing up the poster, because that's the first impression it's going to make. And very often it's portraying a very different film from the one the actors actually did.
The happiest moments for me, creatively, are doing readings of a play around a table where there's no audience.
I don't watch the movies I'm in - ever. Sometimes I keep pictures, but that's it. I used to watch my movies, because I didn't want to be rude to the people making them, but I stopped a few years ago. I think it's pretty common among actors. It's like listening to your own voice, but multiplied by a million.
Who walks around proud of things they've done? That's an obnoxious quality.
I see writing and acting as different parts of the same continuum. Writing is better for intense emotion. If you're very angry about something, you shouldn't present it as strongly when you're acting. But if you're really angry and writing about it, that's the best way to get it out and across.
Actors dread working with studios because they dictate what you do in a way that independent movies can't.
I personally don't feel the need to be radical for its own sake, but I probably couldn't if I tried anyway.
You can tell when you watch a movie, usually, what the actors' experience was on the movie, because even the smallest of roles were interesting.
In 'Zombieland,' it was such a freewheeling plot it almost didn't matter what the characters were doing scene to scene as long as there was a consistent banter.
I tend to be pessimistic about everything: If things seem to be going good, I'm worried that it's going to end; if things are bad, then I'm worried that it's going to be permanent. It's not a very comfortable attitude to have all the time.
As an actor, you are in a unique position because you're not only memorizing dialogue but really embodying it. You naturally feel the rhythm of good writing.
Depression, if it's an unconsciously elected experience, is a luxury.
Nothing is harder than working with an actor who doesn't take it seriously or show up in the same way that you are.
All of my pleasures are guilty, but that's just the way I'm wired.
I don't attribute an actor's great success to their own individual performance when it's something as collaborative as a movie.
I don't go to movies, I don't own a television, I don't buy magazines and I try not to receive mail, so I'm not really aware of popular culture.
I'm not into music - the only music I like is musical theater, but I have every Ween album.
