Oscar Isaac

“I had an audition where Josh Brolin was pelting me with his personality. I didn't get the part.”

“'Cool' is detached and emotionally cool. My instinct is to battle anything that seems overly cool.”

“I was never much of a singer. I was terrible. It's embarrassing: I was trying to sound like everybody else. I went through a big Cure phase, so I was trying to do that kind of dramatic voice.”

“I've never been interested in celebrity.”

“What's funny in 'The Mayor of MacDougal Street' is how Dave Van Ronk talks a lot about the time and how exciting it was and how electric it was.”

“'Drive' is a genre piece, and a lot of times we don't get really sophisticated genre films.”

“Anybody who dedicates himself to exploring the human condition, there's always a detached eye that's watching. In any situation, a little part of me is observing it, to see if there are any raw materials to create something else later.”

“I get attached to things: I wear the same jeans for a year.”

“Usually when I write a song, I'll write the music and then kind of fit some words to it.”

“The first movie I can remember seeing in the theater was 'Return of the Jedi.' I can remember seeing Darth Vader's helmet come off. The shock of that moment.”

“Every frame of a Coen brothers movie is filled with history and meaning, and the deeper you go, the deeper you get. That's why their movies stand up particularly well to repeated viewing and investigation.”

“I think it's good to be a little more fearless in saying what you feel. In not being scared of the repercussions of that.”

“Jessica Lange was my biggest crush when I was a kid.”

“I've never been much of a guitarist. I mean, I've played forever, but I was always more of a rhythm kind of guy. I don't read music.”

“I think romantic passion is wanting a little something in return.”

“I think for some reason we're conditioned in movies that the protagonist must be heroic or redeemable in some way, whereas in theater, that's not a necessary.”

“My dad always played a lot of music, so I heard him playing all the time, and then I decided that I wanted to learn to play guitar, so I got an acoustic and started taking lessons. I wanted to be able to shred like Yngwie Malmsteen.”

“Getting a record deal is a meaningless thing now.”

“I think that when you decide to dedicate yourself to creative endeavors and surround yourself with people who are creative, you very quickly learn how hard it is to survive doing those kinds of things, not to mention make a living at them.”

“I like being like a chameleon who transforms himself with each role.”