Ellen Greene

“I grew up watching old black and white movies where Marlene Dietrich or Jean Harlow would go walking down some cobblestone street in ripped stockings and head into some smoky boite and sing for a pathetic living. That's so what I wanted to be.”

“I like kindness. Who doesn't? Life is definitely too short for self-centered, abusive people.”

“There was a time in my life that my mother told me that they didn't know whether they were going to send me to college or an institution, and it's rough to hear that... Childhood is tough.”

“When I was little, I had to write down what I wanted to be when I grew up, and I wrote, 'I want to be an actress-singer-dancer because you can be a rich fairy princess and tell someone off.'”

“It's a very hard thing for all of us to accept ourselves at all the different stages - the horrible side, the wonderful side, the adorable side - and who you are as a grownup. And then to bring what you learned as a child to that grownup: that is the magic of creativity.”

“I'm proud of myself, people love me and respect me, and I like me. I like who I am.”

“Life is going by, and if you don't do something about your dreams and make them a reality and start to love who you are as yourself, then you will not be able to embrace any of those dreams. Who you are is the immense magic.”

“Sometimes the adversities you go through help you become a person you are proud of, and instead of hating what you're going through, maybe bless it because for some reason; it is going to build you into that person that you are proud of being.”

“I think creating of any sort, whatever line you're in, is paramount - you can be an architect, you can be a banker, you can be anything - I think that when you create, you're closest to God and yourself.”