I'm really enjoying the character now, but I don't want to just be Philip Marlowe. I wouldn't mind playing him every couple of years, perhaps, as a kind of open franchise - you know?
— Powers Boothe
I like to do things that are about relationships, work with quality people, and tell a different kind of story.
Since I've had some success, story and character are always the two elements I think about first in material presented to me. Some of my choices have been more successful than others.
We have real cliched ideas of what prison life is like. It is not a happy place. It's a desperate, sad situation.
I like to think of myself as fairly intellectual.
I was raised a Democrat, and now I'm an Independent.
One thing that's thematically consistent in 'Sin City' is that all the performances seem to be of the same genre, like we're singing the same song.
You don't do classics with a Texas accent.
I've got a family, and I love them, and I want them to have the best opportunities in the best country in the world, and I think we have to fight for it.
I've had presidents in my lifetime - and I'm old enough to have seen several - that I really detested, but they're still my president. I've had presidents that I've really liked.
If I rob a gas station, I'm going to get 15 years. If I steal $400 million on Wall Street, I start plea-bargaining.
If you're down, it's curse; if you're up, it's a blessing.
The first 10 years I was a professional actor, I did Shakespeare.
When I first came to Hollywood, I played about as many guys who save the day and get the girl as I played heavies. It's just that heavies are more interesting and last in people's minds.
Any of us can sort of say we would do any number of things to feed our children.
Some stars can make five or six failures in a row and continue to work - with a raise. I can't figure how that works. Maybe foreign sales or a smart agent.
It's never a matter of career decisions. I don't think in those terms. What matters is whether a role is interesting, if I will enjoy playing it, and if I'm confident I can do a good job.
There are more heroes than cops, FBI agents, and lawyers.
We're in the business of making films, not striking or anything else.
That joy of a creative environment, without any restrictions, is hard to leave.
I come prepared when I come to work. Not just knowing the lines, but I think I know something about what I do.
I'm not going to make my living out of beating my head against somebody else.
We all want to pretend that there isn't evil in the world. We all want to pretend that there aren't people trying to take us out and different things like that.
I've always wanted to play a hard-boiled gumshoe, as they say.
Sometimes, I feel like directors look at me and say, 'I want to put that boy in the jungle. I want to hurt him.'
I was the first one in the family, on either side, to go to college - much less graduate school.
I wanted to be in 'The Emerald Forest.' I chased that one for six months before it all came about. I wanted to work with John Boorman!
I think I'm pretty politically informed, and I find myself watching Senate hearings on C-SPAN.
I've always felt if you followed a real private detective around, it would be boring.
Actors have far fewer choices than the public thinks they do.
There's something about playing the baddies that people like. They're more fun, and people tend to remember them, particularly if you do them well.
If there is anything I am about, it is I want justice in society.
I have always been attracted to good scripts and try hard to make characters as believable as possible. That means trying to figure out how they would react to situations, what they eat, think, and feel.
When 'Deadwood' came along, it was totally like Shakespeare. The long speeches were like soliloquies. If one phrase of a monologue was out of whack, the entire one-page speech didn't work.
I've auditioned five or six times. I'm not very good at it.
Everyone has this vision of Jones as a maniacal ogre. Wrong. He was charming, sweet, and a fabulous speaker.
The office of the presidency is what's important, no matter who's in it.
I was raised a proper Southern boy.
When I'm out there, it's just me. Nobody's controlling me, and I can do whatever I want to do. I'm my own man.
I got a lot of flak; in Texas, football is not only the social thing you must do, but you do it also to prove your manhood. They all couldn't conceive of why I'd want to stop to do 'The Importance of Being Earnest.'
Before I accept a job, I always talk to folks about it. 'Why does he kill these 22 people?' If they say, 'What difference does it make?' I know we have nothing more to talk about. A character has to be three-dimensional.
I've been fortunate in my career to have the opportunity to pick and choose the parts I play. I've also been lucky to always be involved with quality actors, quality directors, quality writers.
