Richard Jenkins

“There's a lot of great directors that I want to work with, but as soon as I mention them, I never get a chance to work with them.”

“I'd like to play the whale in 'Moby Dick.' If I keep eating, I may end up getting there.”

“I don't watch the dailies. You want to just turn in your resignation when you watch the dailies.”

“Any time you die in a film, it's not real, so it's all kind of fun.”

“Sometimes, I can read a great script, and I don't like the part, or I don't think I'm right for it. I mean, there are times I've read really great parts and think there's so many other actors who could do this better than me. And I just say no to it.”

“When I go to the movies, I want to see a human being dealing with their lives. That's all I ask.”

“I love it when a director says, 'I don't know.'”

“It's like, in movies where you talk to the audience 90 percent of the time, it's - you kind of want to stay away from that stuff. But, you know - but to write exposition brilliantly is hard.”

“But I loved making 'Eat Pray Love,' and I loved working with Julia Roberts.”

“I can't think of a lot of bad directors I've worked with, really.”

“There's nothing like walking onto a Hollywood sound stage.”

“I was an only child, and I spent a lot of time alone. My dad was an only child, too, so we didn't have a big family, and I was really close with both of my parents. Like any kid, I thought I knew more than they did.”

“When I was about 12, I came home from middle school and told my parents I wanted to be an actor. My father didn't say it to me, but he told my mom, 'No. I'm not going to allow that. He'll starve to death.' I grew up in a small town in Illinois where being an actor was not something people did.”