Giancarlo Esposito Quotes

I came from a divorced mother and father, obviously mixed race.

My advice for achieving success is to make a career choice that reflects your passion. Then work your craft a little bit each day - even if someone's not paying you to do it. Try to balance your social life with your educational (or professional) life, and have patience.

To be a character actor is to be open, to be a chameleon.

I have from time to time been a double A or triple A personality. I'm not anymore. I'm more lenient on myself.

I love the smell of fried chicken.

I try to be careful with my persuasiveness. When my heart is really behind it, and when I have no ulterior motive, then I know I’m truly persuasive.

I have this vision that I'm really watching each one of my daughters start to become women, and mothers. And this is what's gonna save our planet.

Middle-class people are becoming desperate. It can cause a moral man to break bad.

People who have not done their research on me do not know that I am European, born in Copenhagen, Denmark to an Italian father from Napoli and a mother from Alabama who was singing opera and went to Europe, met my dad, fell in love, and then moved back to Rome, where I was raised, between Rome and Hamburg.

I first felt successful when I was 13 and in a show called "Seesaw." I came offstage and heard the applause of the theater audience and felt a sense of accomplishment. Around that time, my role model for success was Burt Lancaster. He was one of the first actors in Hollywood to start his own production company, and I respected him because he created something he believed in.

I always wanted to be a boy scout but was too poor. Couldn't do it.

After 'Breaking Bad,' people are very frightened of who I am. They back away from me on the street.

You can never lead unless you follow.

There is a price to pay for most of our actions. For every action, there is a reaction.

I often think about, 'How do we return to a simpler way of living? Is there some way that we can start to think of each other as human beings again, instead of worshiping money, instead of worshiping electronics, instead of worshiping getting ahead just for me?'

I'm a big fan of period pieces, and I'm a big fan of the old-time westerns.

When I perform on stage, you have to remember my performance or buy another ticket to the party! In television and film, you can see it over and over again.

Who told you to step on my sneakers? Who told you to walk on my side of the block? Who told you to be in my neighborhood?

Yoga has allowed me to bring my complete spirit together, which allows me to do less, which is more.

I've learned to become a progressive man because I have four women in my life. And their mother, who I'm not married to anymore, but who impresses me because of our relationship. Because we have a very deep and friendly relationship that is completely about who we really are now. Before it was husband, wife, mother, father. But now it's about who we are as human beings. Because we didn't give up on each other. And because we didn't hurt each other and blister each other from a divorce. We became tight. Best friends. And more than that even, because now we're best parents.

I'm not too into fast food, but you know if I was, it would be chicken.

I don't think anyone is black and white and I think we change our minds and our attitudes about certain things as we grow to our maturity.

We want to remember to be playful! We're here in this wonderful and incredible world! Like, the grand architect of the universe created this playground. And we're supposed to have fun, and we're supposed to play.

I feel that sometimes, holding yourself as black, saying that is your sole identity, can sometimes stand in your way of being a member of the humanity of man, being a member of the family of the divine.

My rule is simply "love what you do". That certainly has brought me to the place I where am at right now. It really has been with the work.

I feel that our stories are cross culturally irrelevant, and I'm a member if a larger community of people who have no boundaries in terms of color or in terms of how I look at other people and their stories.

I feel that if you can transcend the color of your skin, with your talent, why carry that as a badge or a label?

For me, listening to my breath in between the lines, allows me to be in deep connection to my spirit.

I practice yoga every day. The practice calms my spirit, and allows me to be present.

I'm naturally a graceful human being. So meditation helps me stay grounded. When we're silent for a moment, it helps us to hear the hum of the universe. Hear the message or what the universe is trying to tell you. It's your inner voice and instinct. If you're hearing that, then you're in the flow of things. It takes years to try and trust that.

As human beings, when we're young, we're not jaded. As we grow older, we begin to take on ideas of our parents, family of origins and that changes us. We become less fluid sometimes. So for me, I look for roles that are uplifting in many ways - no matter what the race or color of the role is. I want to go beyond that and try to share what I think my gift is and that is we all have this gift of choice. We just don't sometimes realize we have that choice.

It was amazing to be nominated by the Academy who saw fit for me to be nominated for best supporting actor. The Critic's choice award was wonderful. I'm on cloud nine.

We're living in a time where we want to be entertained but I think part of what people are looking for, that they don't even know they're looking for is to be uplifted in many ways.

In my culture, my mother's sisters are also my mother. And my father's sisters are my mother's, too. So I have many mothers. My mom has a fierce love for her children. And she's known to say things like if you die I'll kill you.

I have a lot of very, very powerful women in my life. My mother being the first.

There is a dream that the world could be at peace, but that requires that all the folks with arms disarm, or take over all the arms and allow us to trust them.

I can only control what I do. I can try to suggest and be open, but trust is the key.

I take things very seriously, and I give myself time to come down and to ramp up, and it's an inside spiritual journey for me. I feel like acting is a way of feeling your personality, and it's really special. Special to have this kind of effect on people. You can only have that effect if you're really outside of yourself. You can't look at yourself and do what I do at the same time. I have done it that way in the past, but it doesn't really work. I can only soar within the parameters of time, and I use music analogies.

I know from teaching, that actors want to act. Even the subtlest actors can do a little too much.

If I can look at each character that I am given and create them in a different way from the last role, I'm happy.

It's certain that the death of an actor can be on a television screen playing the same thing every week.

I believe acting is very physical, and when you have to fight or do those kinds of things, it takes a lot of respect not to allow yourself to go off and hurt yourself or someone else.

I have four daughters, the eldest is 19, the youngest is 12, and I watched all of them journey into motherhood. Motherhood is very deep. It starts when you're very, very young. Now, my 12 year old comes in, wants to put me to bed. And she'll, you know, put her hand on my forehead and say the prayer with me. As for years I've done for her! It's almost like a very beautiful, natural transition.

I can fish from a stick and a string.

I had to work from a young age.

There's such a grace and understanding in the female persona when women have really come into their own. Part of that is to have children, and to be caring for those children, and not only in the care for them, but also in the nurturing and raising of them, they have to pass on their souls and their intelligence. And all those things can't be taught. It's something that, that in the essence of a woman, the essence of a mother, a mother knows!

I love to read, and I like the fact that there's some silence in my life.

I want a body of work; I want a good story after a good story.

I'm interested in spirituality and in religion and our relationship to the divine.

I'm not someone who is a fan of a lot of violence.