Top 60 Julianne Moore Quotes

With actors, all our ages are out there for all to see – you can’t hide anything, really. And it’s kind of a relief. This is my age, this is what I look like without makeup on – who cares? That youth culture – that lying about your age – it’s all denial of death anyway.

When you have children, you don’t have downtime, but I have a family life that is rich and fulfiling.

Parenthood is a very, very intense experience.

I do love my work. As an actor, you live from job to job, though, and you have to be prepared for that.

My life may be a pretty crazy life at times, but it’s a very privileged one – being able to earn a good living doing what you love. Not many people have such an opportunity.

Within childhood behaviors, there are known behaviors; there’s teasing and there’s name-calling, and different kinds of things happen as kids start to socialize. And then there’s serious bullying, and then there’s actual aggression and behavioral problems. But you can’t put it all under the tent of bullying.

I read a lot growing up. It was kind of my comfort, you know; I loved it. I love story. I love narrative. I was academic. I wasn’t particularly athletic. I didn’t make the drill team. I didn’t go out for sports.

I love going to Scotland.

When I was seven, these kids in the alley behind our house in Omaha called me Freckleface Strawberry. I hated my freckles, and I hated that name. I thought it was humiliating in the way that only a seven-year-old could hate it.

You’d have to spend a lot of time with me before I’d be comfortable enough to show my dark side.

I can see how Americans misconstrue British reserve, and I can see how British people misconstrue American enthusiasm. I think I’m somewhere in between the two. Although I’m outgoing, I’m also very private.

My father was a military judge, and my mother was a psychiatric social worker. My brother and sister and I were moved around constantly, in and outside the U.S., living in Germany for much of our teens.

I’m not scared of many things in front of the camera. Everywhere else, yes, I’m terrified. But acting is just pretending, and you are exploring feelings in a safe environment.

It’s not difficult to take care of a child; it’s difficult to do anything else while taking care of a child. Trying to clean up the kitchen after you’ve had a baby is a nightmare because you have to wait for the baby to be asleep, you’re exhausted, and you really don’t want to clean up the kitchen now.

I moved frequently because my dad was in the army, so I was always new in school. I think if you’ve ever done that, you know what it means to not matter in a room. I think it’s a good experience for everyone to have, to feel like they’re not noticed, because it teaches you to be empathetic.

I do remember when I was starting acting, going from one set to the next, with not much else going on in my life. And at the end of the day, you get back to your hotel room and just feel this awful loneliness, because the cameras have stopped rolling.

Every modern woman shops everywhere for beauty, but for me it’s mostly the airport or the drugstore.

Well, you know, I mean, she was so wonderful, and she really played the role to perfection.

Being middle-aged is about realising that you’ve lived most of your life. You don’t have as much time in front of you as you have behind you.

The worst thing you could do is scare a kid or trick them. Never, ever, ever do that.

It’s hard to keep the romance going sometimes. Because you have a job. And you have children. And you have a house and a dog. And something leaks in the basement, and somebody has to take the dog to the vet… you’re exhausted.

I think people are always really surprised when they realise I’m not a very serious person and that I’m not tremendously serious about acting. I don’t like to rehearse; I hate improv. Directors that don’t like to talk, they’re my favourite ones.

As an actor, all you have is what you know and what you see in other people. The more you know, and the more you’ve experienced, the more you’re able to communicate to other people.

The thing about having a very young mother who had you at 20 is that you expect that you’re going to be old ladies together.

My mother was from Scotland and had very fair skin… she wouldn’t allow us to go in the sun.

In my opinion, you don’t get to have privacy when you’re only 16!

Too much makeup on an older woman can really make you look like a freak.

I’m not someone who is driven by big external stories. I like big emotional stories.

I love clothes – I love shopping for clothes, I love wearing clothes, I love talking about clothes – but oddly, putting on the dress and walking around in front of people, that’s the place where I’m most uncomfortable.

I think everybody’s political. The act of being alive is political. Unless you choose to be a hermit, you’re automatically political because you’re part of a community.

I’ve got more freckles than just about anybody. My children didn’t get them, thankfully. They have tiny little freckles.

My mom worked as a psychiatric social worker. She was interested in people, and I guess I am, too. So we would talk about the people that we knew, and why they behaved the way they did.

When my son first started to take the subway, my husband and I used to follow him to make sure he was all right, and then we had to stop following him and let him do it by himself.

The only reason I got married in 2003 was for my children. I had a therapist who said marriage is really a container for a family, and that made sense to me.

My mom came to the U.S. very young, and then she married very young. But she was never American. She was always Scottish and would make sure that I knew that I was, too.

When I go to a movie and can’t figure it out, I’m just thrilled.

Every child is so different. Their experience growing up and their experience relating to the world has so much to do with their temperament, and their likes and their dislikes.

I did find it particularly difficult to do Broadway. It was not my favourite way to perform. When I do theatre, I like it to be smaller. I like the audience to be closer; I like it to be less presentational.

I do like to work. I have my kids’ books that I do, I have movies that I do, and I model.

Even ordinary people aren’t ordinary, not really. They’re filled up with thoughts and feelings that you might never know are there until they suddenly materialise.

I think it’s always hard to find great roles, no matter what age you are. So I always say to people, ‘You have to remember that Hollywood is in the business of making movies that they can sell tickets to; they’re not in the business of finding great roles for actors.’

I’ve always been somebody who’s acutely aware of my mortality.

Behavior is mutable. It changes from place to place. It’s like accents, dialect – it varies from one area to another. But there are universal truths about what it means to be a human being. All the other stuff is like applique. Learning that was interesting to me and probably useful for becoming an actor.

I think everybody has had emotional distress, but yes, I think I’m pretty stable.

It’s very important for me to be absolutely present in order to be emotional.

My mother brought us to the library every week, and I read a lot. That’s what kept me company. I went from school to school, but there was always reading.

I knew from very early on that I wanted kids. I wasn’t one of those women who goes, ‘Well, if it happens, it happens.’ I really wanted a family. Although I didn’t actually have my first child until I was 37, I always felt I’d get there.

She’s in a situation she tried to, that’s what’s complicated. She followed orders; she called off the raid. This is a dangerous situation. Somebody in DC police went ahead and started.

My family life is incredibly important to me. I want to be with them as much as I can. I try to work in New York, or I work in the summer time when my family can come with me.

Whenever I’m doing anything romantic with an actor, or if there’s a director around, I never want anybody’s wife to feel threatened by me.

You have to be in yourself, but engage with the world and see what’s going on.

I can only be in the sun for 15 minutes before burning. I have sunscreen on my face every day. If I’m walking on the sunny side of the street, I’ll walk to the shady side. I’m too uncomfortable in the sun.

The one thing that kids need is consistency.

We allow for many more gradations of personality in life than we do in art.

I’m not really afraid of things that are imaginary. I enjoy it. I enjoy big narrative, and I enjoy big feelings. Having a feeling is never going to kill you.

I have a husband and two kids, and they’re usually around when I’m shooting, then I go home. We have dinner, and that’s what I’m dealing with when I go home.

When I was younger, I thought I had to shut myself off, work really hard to cry. I learned after a while that that’s just not… You know, often in life, you cry when you’re caught off-guard. That’s where I need to be when I’m acting, too.

Really, you want to have variety as an actor. If you spend your career doing one thing solidly, people get burned out.