I grew up in a family of strong women and I owe any capacity I have to understand women to my mother and big sister. They taught me to respect women in a way where I've always felt a strong emotional connection to women which has also helped me in the way I approach my work as an actor.

Young actors often don't think of the consequences of doing nudity or sex scenes. They want the role so badly that they agree to be exploited and then end up embarrassing family friends and even strangers.

My grandfather's family used to own a pasta factory in Naples and they would go door-to-door selling their pasta. So his love of food came from his parents which was then passed down to my mother and then again to me.

My father was brought up in an orphanage in the Catskills. He was a factory worker. And because his family wasn't there for him family was everything. We could disagree inside the house but outside the house it was us against the world. So when I became a drag actor he looked sideways but said okay.

Actors are one family over the entire world.

You need to develop somehow a huge amount of faith and confidence in yourself because there's a lot of rejection throughout an actor's life and you have to believe in yourself more than anyone else.

I was never the ingenue so hopefully that'll make it easier to age and still work. I know a lot of actors who are really dissatisfied with where they're at even though some of them are huge stars and I feel like 'Oh my God you're at the top.' Something interesting will come. It always does. I have faith.

I was brought up the Mexican way where actors are paid very little and every part you take is an act of faith. If people respect that then great.

In my career as an actor there is a catchphrase that Scofield always says often in regards to his brother 'Have a little faith.' In my own career as an actor there were times when I was the only one who believed in myself in the face of the odds.

I just can't say enough about the actors having faith and trust in the writers and the writers having faith and trust in the actors.

All an actor has is their blind faith that they are who they say they are today in any scene.

Religious faith depends on a host of social psychological and emotional factors that have little or nothing to do with probabilities evidence and logic.

Faith is the first factor in a life devoted to service. Without it nothing is possible. With it nothing is impossible.

I've learned to think in terms of having a long career. Actors can have very long careers that last until the day we die but there will be moments when you'll feel like you're a failure or when you're disappointed in yourself.

But all actors go through the process it's hit and miss you have achievement and failure.

The only reason my work seems to be eclectic up to a certain period is because I was a failure as an actor.

One must never assume that a character is sympathetic because of either the actor playing them or the fact that they're a lead. I think that's a recipe for failure actually because if they become unsympathetic you lose your audience.