Quotes By Jessica Lange

Because Shakespeare's language is so expansive, we're under this misconception that it's difficult. But I discovered that it's easy because it's so brilliantly written. The words are perfect, and the language is intelligent and very emotional.

Once I started on 'Frances' I discovered it was literally a bottomless well. It devastated me to maintain that for eighteen weeks, to be immersed in this state of rage for twelve to eighteen hours a day. It spilled all over, into other areas of my life.

To stay interested in acting, I have to keep trying stuff I've never done before.

The natural state of motherhood is unselfishness. When you become a mother, you are no longer the center of your own universe. You relinquish that position to your children.

If I didn't have children I'd be a much better actress. I wouldn't be so distracted. I could pour 100 percent of my energies into it, to promote the investigation which acting is.

I am tortured when I am away from my family, from my children. I am horribly guilt-ridden.

There was that feminist myth that we can do everything. I don't think you can.

In families there is always the mythology. My father died when my kids were quite young still, and yet they still tell his stories. That is how a person lives on.

I have been a waitress, and I was a damn fine waitress too, let me tell you.

I had never done Shakespeare before, but I don't think you can be an actor and not do it. There were moments when I thought, I'm just not going to be able to pull this off.

I've been thinking a lot about next year, which will be the first time in 25 years that I don't have a child at home.

Families survive, one way or another. You have a tie, a connection that exists long after death, through many lifetimes.

I never think of the future. I never imagine what comes next.

Allow the diversity to exist. There is nothing wrong with it. Hell, we put up with the religious right-we can put up with transgendered human beings.

I never felt like I belonged in Minnesota when I was growing up there. That's why I was out the door as soon as I turned 18.

I have made decisions based from purely an actor's point of view.

Sometimes parts just come along when it's the perfect time for you to do them.

Acceptance and tolerance and forgiveness, those are life-altering lessons.

One of the things I love about acting is that it reveals a certain something about yourself, but it doesn't reveal your own personal story.

The worst is when I talk myself into something. Sometimes you take things because you want to work with a certain actor, or you want to work with a director, even if the script or the part's not that great.

I could be making a lot more money now if I had chosen a different kind of movie, but none of that matters to me... I've done the parts I wanted to do.

Your children are grown and your career has slowed down - all the stuff that took up so much attention is gone, and you're left with expansive time and space. You have to reimagine who you are and what life is about.

For me, nothing has ever taken precedence over being a mother and having a family and a home.

At a certain age, death becomes familiar to you-or a loss becomes familiar-the tragedies that are more commonplace in life.

Photography was a blessing because it filled my time.

Successful model? That's a myth. The year I modeled was the most painful year of my life. Editors would always talk to you in the third person as though you were merely a piece of merchandise.

I love being a mother. I loved being a daughter, a sister, a wife. I love being a woman with men. I love having given birth.

This idea of selfishness as a virtue, as opposed to generosity: That, to me, is unnatural.

If I had to start over, I'd pursue photography - probably to the exclusion of acting.

When I am home for like a two-year stretch, I get antsy, because I want to work.