Marian Seldes's Quotes

I think the first time I was ever really conscious of the difference between people's voices was that my mother's voice was so soft and gentle and her pronunciation was so perfect.

Unfortunately, there are mental invalids of every age who exist on other people's terms. It's lazy for older persons to let others make up their minds for them. People have to overcome that.

Acting takes so much energy.

All I've done is live my life in the theater and loved it.

An actress spends a lifetime observing people. You build up a mental library. No, not a library. Make that a repository.

I almost never go to the theatre without seeing someone I've taught or known at Juilliard.

I always think of myself as an 18-year-old beginning my career, all the time.

I have had a career in which, almost without exception, every single person I've worked with has helped me.

I know I'm funny, because I'm eccentric, I'm odd. I'm not what you expect.

I love being with someone, taking care of someone.

I think of myself as only being an actress when I'm acting, but my friends will say I act all the time.

I try to find humor in everything I do, because I think all great plays - even great tragedies - have enormous humor in them.

I would hate to think of the theatre world without critics. Without them, we'd not have the record of each season.

I'm fairly obedient. I do what I'm told.

I'm not a good tourist. I don't like walking around and looking at things. I like being in a city and working and finding out how other people live.

I've been, for want of a better phrase, a supporting actress so much of my life.

I've never been obsessed by how I looked. In fact, I would rather have looked more ordinary so I could play more parts more truthfully.

If I had a religious belief, I would want it to be as strong as my belief in the theater.

If you're unhappy in a relationship, I think you just don't trust yourself for getting into another one.

People say, 'How can you stay in a play for a long time?' I say, 'The audience is never the same.'

The kind of acting I love is when you watch and you discover what you think perhaps you weren't supposed to see: the chink in the armor.

Theatre is where I am confident and happy.

There's no trick of teaching acting. Either someone wants to do it and is gifted, or not.

When I began to act, I was about 6 years old. Everything you learned, every period of history you studied, you did a play about it.

Confidence has nothing to do with what you look like. If you obsess over that, you'll end up being disappointed in yourself all the time. Instead, high self-esteem comes from how you feel in any moment. So walk into a room acting like you're in charge, and spend your energy on making the people around you happy.

How do people who live utterly alone survive? There are so many things that won't open. I've got a few dresses in New York, and I can somehow get them on, but I can't get them off.