Jack Nicholson
Jack Nicholson
John Joseph "Jack" Nicholsonis an American actor and filmmaker, having performed for nearly 60 years. He is known for playing a wide range of starring or supporting roles, including satirical comedy, romance and dark portrayals of excitable and psychopathic characters. In many of his films, he has played the "eternal outsider, the sardonic drifter", and someone who rebels against the social structure...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionMovie Actor
Date of Birth22 April 1937
CityNeptune City, NY
CountryUnited States of America
There are many directors in the middle range who've made mostly successful pictures, and then there are a few great directors who've had some successes and some failures. I suppose my life would be smoother if I wasn't almost totally enamored of the latter category.
When you use a dialect, you worry that the people you're imitating will think you're making fun of them.
Many actors will try something different once, but if it isn't a box office success they'll never do it again. In my opinion, there's no point in going on with this job if you do the same thing over and over again.
For an actor, style comes last. You first have to implement the whole thing, but your style comes from the subconscious, which is the best part an actor brings to his work.
I have mainly been interested in acting. I think it's a great job, a fine way to live your life.
If you're going to write, write one poem all your life, let nobody read it, and then burn it. This is very young thinking, I confess, but it is the seminal part of my life.
In the real world there's an after-effect of disappointment if you lose an argument. But if, to begin with, you're set up not to have this particular autonomy, then you're not disappointed.
That's what I like about the movie business: you're always in contact with wonderful and interesting people.
I have never felt brutalized as an actor. Many actors do, some times, but I've never had that experience. If I'm not happy with the balance, I just won't work with that person again.
I wasn't a babe in the woods. I'd watched a lot of stars, from James Dean to Brando, and I'd seen everybody alive work at MGM. I had a certain old-timer's quality, even though I was young and new, and drew on what I believed before I made it.
The way I reacted to 9/11 was I decided I didn't want to do any movies that are sad or critical. I decided I didn't want to make my living depressing people or making them go home sick, so I just decided I wanted to do comedy for a while and study it for a while. It doesn't mean everybody should do that, but that was my reaction.
I think human beings have a basic instinct to be free and explore their world in their own way. I've always been driven to look at life as something which we should try to plunge into rather than sit back. You have to be able to have fun and keep creating a sense of excitement to how you approach the world.
The fuel for the sports fan is the ability to have private theories.
I'm against cronyism, and I had to learn that early on. Like, I don't have an entourage, because I saw the negative effects of those things.