Steve Buscemi famous quotes

What's "God"? Well, you know, when you want something really bad and you close your eyes and you wish for it? God's the guy that ignores you.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Atheist #Eye #Guy

Character actors just pile up the credits because you work on a movie for like a few days. It's not like I'm the lead in everything I do - far from it. I'm not spending three or four months on a picture; I'm spending three or four weeks. Sometimes three or four days.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Character #Three #Credit

Just because people want to eat the burger doesn't mean they want to meet the cow.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Mean #People #Want

I don't think I'm that much different from any other working actor that's trying to make a living.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Thinking #Trying #Different

Really interesting things come because you don't know what the rules are, what you can and can't do.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Interesting #Interesting Things #Really Interesting

Whenever you do something that is in a continuous take, and something that we're not used to doing, because it was all in the details of if you don't make one move seem natural it can give away all of it.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Moving #Giving #Details

Do you think god stays in heaven because he too lives in fear of what he's created here on earth?
-- Steve Buscemi

#Thinking #Heaven #Earth

I've always loved comedy and growing up it was the comedies that I really responded to. So I don't know how it turned out that once I started acting that I started getting a certain kind of role, that I never saw myself as growing up, so I really love when I get an opportunity to play a [comedian] role.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Growing Up #Opportunity #Play

I don't tend to think of the characters i play as losers. I like the struggles that people have, people who are feeling like they don't fit into society, because I still sort of feel that way.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Struggle #Character #Thinking

We both [with Jo Andres] think that it is really important to our culture that we support all kinds of music, all kinds of theatre and all kinds of art because you never know what moves people. We've always believed that there should be a strong voice outside the commercial world. Certainly, the commercial world has a huge place in our culture and we also support that - but, we also want to support the stuff that lives outside of that.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Strong #Art #Moving

I never made a daring rescue, which is the story people want to hear. I did go to my share of fires.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Fire #People #Stories

Oftentimes you'll see stuff that makes it into the mainstream that has been influenced by things that are clearly not from the mainstream.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Stuff #Mainstream

It doesn't matter what part I play, I try and commit myself 100 percent.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Play #Trying #Matter

My real training as an actor was when I started doing theatre.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Real #Training #Theatre

I talked with Quentin about where the character came from, and he told me Kansas City. I don't know how somebody talks from Kansas City, so I made him from New York.
-- Steve Buscemi

#New York #Character #Cities

Communication is the key, and it's one thing I had to learn-to talk to the actors. I was so involved with the visual and technical aspects that I would forget about the actors.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Communication #Keys #Actors

I can't relate to 99% of humanity.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Humanity #Relate

I usually get freaked out if I'm in a situation where a lot of people recognise me at once.
-- Steve Buscemi

#People #Situation #Recognise

I was going to buy a van and move to LA so I could secretly pursue acting without any of my friends knowing.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Moving #Knowing #Acting

It wasn't until my senior year in high school that I started acting.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Senior #School #Years

I never had any master plan about directing, and I don't really write.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Writing #Masters #Plans

I never did improv professionally, but that was certainly in my training as an actor. I like it.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Training #Actors

I like telling stories about people with problems. I can't really put it much simpler than that.
-- Steve Buscemi

#People #Stories #Telling Stories

I've certainly worked with really great directors who haven't acted.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Directors #Really Great

All the roles I play, I don't see any of my roles in films that they're typically leading men.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Men #Play #Roles

I've had dentists who have wanted to help me out, but I say, 'You know, I won't work again if you fix my teeth,'
-- Steve Buscemi

#Teeth #Helping #Dentist

I'm terrible at story and structure, but I'm not so bad at writing dialogue.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Writing #Stories #Structure

They're not supposed to show prison films in prison. Especially ones that are about escaping.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Escaping #Bail #Film

I think all comics borrow from each other. Only a few have an original voice, and I wasn't one of them. In the end, I couldn't figure out who to steal from, so I stopped doing it.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Thinking #Voice #Stealing

It doesn't matter to me what the genre is.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Matter #Genre

I suppose things are better now, but ... I don't know. People still hate each other, they just know how to hide it better.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Hate #People #Hatred

What if I told you insane was working fifty hours a week in some office for fifty years at the end of which they tell you to p*ss off; ending up in some retirement village hoping to die before suffering the indignity of trying to make it to the toilet on time? Wouldn't you consider that to be insane?
-- Steve Buscemi

#Retirement #Years #Office

When I was a fireman I was in a lot of burning buildings. It was a great job, the only job I ever had that compares with the thrill of acting.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Jobs #Theatre #Acting

The first movie I had a featured role in was Parting Glances.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Firsts #Roles #Glances

I was very surprised that for a while I could only get cast as straight. It was that way for a few years.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Years #Way #Casts

Directing television is really hard - it's so fast. You shoot an hour show in seven days.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Television #Seven #Hours

It doesn't matter so much where the material comes from, as long as it's good.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Long #Matter #Materials

When I was in pre-production for Trees Lounge, I was hearing the cinematographer talking with the production designer about colours and this and that, and feeling like I was losing control.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Talking #Tree #Feelings

What was frustrating about Armageddon was the time I spent not doing anything. It was a big special effects film, and I wasn't crazy about pretending I was in outer space. It feels ridiculous.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Crazy #Space #Special

In the beginning, it wasn't even a question of deciding I'm going to do independent film and not commercial films - I wasn't being offered any commercial films, and there wasn't an independent scene.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Independent #Film #Scene

I didn't think I'd ever be able to do movies. That was for serious actors.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Thinking #Serious #Actors

I didn't really like the aloneness of doing stand-up.
-- Steve Buscemi

I did stand-up. I loved George Carlin and Steve Martin.
-- Steve Buscemi

I could never have imagined the films I've done and the people I've worked with when I was starting out; I certainly did not have a career path.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Careers #People #Done

I always find that it's when a script is not detailed, then I have to do more work as an actor.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Actors #Scripts

Every day's an adventure when I step out of my door. That's why I usually wear a hat and keep my head low.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Adventure #Doors #Hats

Casting is everything. Getting the person that you imagined is this character and then seeing what they bring to it.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Character #Casting #Persons

Bob Altman had this relaxed but serious attitude. Everybody loved him. I wanted him to adopt me.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Attitude #Serious #Bob

I don't think about the characters I choose to play, analytically or consciously.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Character #Thinking #Play

I had a magic kit. I never really followed through on it, but I had my phase of wanting to do it, sure.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Magic #Phases

By nature, I think I am a pretty private person, and that is what is hard even doing interviews for films that I really love doing, because in some ways, it diminishes the experience that I had.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Thinking #Interviews #Way

Trees Lounge is based on my own life. Both my parents like the movie. My father, of course, thinks it's a masterpiece.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Father #Thinking #Tree

The trend now is to shoot in Canada because it's cheaper, and they don't care what the location is.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Trends #Canada #Location

The director I had most involvement with was Alex Rockwell. He gave me a lot of responsibility as an actor.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Responsibility #Actors #Directors

My greatest hope was to get discovered as a comedian and get on a sitcom.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Comedian #Sitcom

My favorite review described me as the cinematic equivalent of junk mail. I don't know what that means, but it sounds like a dig.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Humorous #Mean #Profound

I like character-driven stuff. It doesn't matter, the size of the part.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Character #Matter #Stuff

I just like playing interesting, complex, complicated characters. I like films that also have an element of humor.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Character #Interesting #Elements

Anything you write, even if you have to start over, is valuable. I let the story write itself through the characters.
-- Steve Buscemi

#Character #Writing #Starting Over