Quotes

I try to avoid the sweet-ass roles.

If I had some fake tanner, I'd like to play 'Ernesto 'Che' Guevara' ! I think I kind of look like him except for my skin tone. But seriously, He's one of my idols.

For Sin City (2005) the director wanted me to talk in a certain voice for this character. So I left my audition on an answering machine. It worked.

I've always chosen the movies and roles that I do solely by the content. That's what I've always tried to do. Something like T3 was so unexpected for me, and was not something I can honestly say that I expected to be doing, given the films I'd been in before. I think that the scale of a movie and the budget a lot of times determines the quality. Sometimes you find that there is better material in small and more independent movies. There's more risk-taking. I want to keep doing that for the future and choose projects based on the content and the role, and how good those are. And I think the budget of movie to me is somewhat secondary. - On his career choices.

[on being asked if he would like to appear in Terminator Salvation (2009)] I don't care really, to be honest. I don't have much interest.

(On his initial reaction to living in Los Angeles) It's a place built on this industry, and that's hard to get used to. Whenever your career is not on your mind, then there is always something there to remind you of it. Early on, it was very competitive in that way, and I am not an extremely competitive person. I had to find ways to enjoy it. I had to do my own thing and not get caught up in that kind of rat race.

I've been lucky to get to do good films. That's all I've ever asked for. Acting is the only thing I've ever done. A studio film would be great to do. I'm not opposed to any genre or budget. A lot of times the smaller films happen to be the better ones - that's just the way it is. But I'm not opposed to doing bigger films, as long as they're not god-awful.

(On Brad Renfro's death and working with him on Bully (2001)) There was a lot of recreational drinking and things like that going on during the shoot. For someone like me, who has been through drugs and drinking, it was pretty easy to spot that Brad had problems.

(On being a child actor) I had sort of a dual life in a way - I was going away and doing films, and then coming back, and hanging out with friends, and getting into trouble, and experimenting with drugs, and doing all that stuff, and so my teenage years had some darker times to them, that aren't the fondest memories for me.

(On playing "Yellow Bastard" in Sin City (2005)) Well, first of all, just to give you kind of the back story on getting that role, it was not a role I was supposed to do. I was just supposed to be in the beginning of the film, when it's me without the make-up, before he later turned into [the Yellow Bastard]. And they had another actor who was set to do the Yellow Bastard role - and he fell out of the movie, he had a conflict or something, so Robert Rodriguez called me to and he just said, "Hey man, maybe you could do both, and maybe we can see that it's you, kind of, through the makeup, and maybe it'll be even better". And I thought it was cool because, it's a bigger role obviously, and I got to do more on the film. But I was intimidated by doing this theatrical cartoonish thing. It's obviously drawn a certain way, and you can get kind of a voice of this crazy character through Frank Miller's writing, but I was really intimidated because I still didn't know completely what Frank had in mind. This character...when he actually speaks, and he moves around, and his physicality, and I was like, "I don't know what to do. I have to - obviously this is really broad, and I have to make this into something big, and something scary". But really I was kind of in the dark about it. I was just hoping that what I did synched up with what they wanted. They didn't fire me, so I guess it was okay. But I don't ever want to wear that many prosthetics again in my life! It was miserable. Not only grueling time-wise to put it on - but, you know, just sitting there in it. It's stiflingly hot, you can't move. You feel like you're stuck together. Luckily we only did that character....I only had makeup on for, I think, five days. It was shot so fast on video, rapid-fire.

(2008 quote on landing parts and the politics of Hollywood) I like auditioning; I've always felt comfortable with doing it. I mean, I've always felt more comfortable in an audition than a meeting. I think it's the same reason why I have such nervousness about public speaking and things like that. But as soon as I'm filming or onstage or something like that, I just never have. I'm kind of in that world, maybe, in character, and so I can do that, no problem. But having to meet some strangers and talk about myself for an hour, it's a lot more difficult for me. So, I've never had a problem with auditioning, and especially if it's for something that I really like. You know, all that I have ever been frustrated about, or wanted, was just the opportunity to do it, to audition, and actually have a fair competition. Because...it's taken me a long time to come to terms with the politics of this, of the town, you know, and sometimes, it sucks to have to abandon a movie that you're really proud of and then go on and have to do something that you don't really believe in, because you need money. But I've also been really fortunate that I've never had to have...a job, a real job, in my life. You know, I'm twenty-eight years old, and that's pretty amazing. And that feels good. What gets really hard to deal with sometimes, when it comes to the politics of the town - and by that, I mean if someone has a lot of popularity in the moment, they'll just get offered something for that reason. But you know, if that [level of popularity] happens with me. I'm obviously gonna have a different take on it. But if I'm not able to even read, to even go in on something...that's hard to deal with. Because if I'm up against someone who's genuinely better for the role, that's great, I can totally deal with that, that's fine. It's the lack of opportunity that's really hard to deal with sometimes. It's just part of the business end of things, which has never been my strength.

(On auditioning for Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines (2003)) I went in for the first audition, which led to five or more auditions and two or three screen tests. It was pretty intense - each time it was one or two hours, really hatching it out.

[Interview with Fred Topel, December 2013] I'm not doing a lot of work right now. I'm sort of focusing on life stuff and things are going good, so I'm not really looking a lot into the future at the moment. That's sort of what's necessary for me, so a lot of what I'm focusing on really is my daughter, my family and things like that. If that's the case, that's awesome. I love films and acting. That's what I've always done. It's really all that I know how to do, so that would be fantastic and I'd love to do it in the future.

I was an escapist, the guy who wanted to get out of school and out of the suburbs... Acting saved me.

[on Carnivàle (2003) getting canceled] It ended because there weren't enough people watching it. It's pretty simple and comes down to not enough people watching versus the amount of money they spend on each episode. I would say more people come up to me about that than anything else. It was on a premium channel, which narrowed the field of viewers off the bat. It never had the numbers that they wanted. But the fans that it had were very hard-core and loyal fans that loved it. It kept us going for two seasons.