[On acting]: "It`s nice to get paid for therapy rather than having to pay $240 an hour for it."

I never direct myself, because I don`t like working with me. I would punch me in the mouth if I had to take my direction.

I`ve always felt there were aspects of me that were monstrous, and you can either hide from it or confront it, embrace it and understand that those are aspects that make you unique and define you and motivate you. You can either overwhelm or overcompensate for them -- but they truly define you as a human being...So that life became a question of either dealing with this monstrousness in one way or another...One finds a way to understand and make friends with that monster and understand that that`s the very thing that makes you who you are. That`s your emotional and spiritual fingerprint.

I`d be dead without my sense of humor. I can`t imagine processing the shit we are slogging our way through in life without it. In a twenty-four-hour space, you get an acute sense of how all of this injustice and out-rage is absurd. There are things that are truly serious, like when one loses his health or gets into a life- threatening accident. But the rest of it.... If you can`t laugh your way through life, then you are fucked. Humor was the first form of armor I ever wore to counteract my self-image. The first girl I ever asked out on a date laughed at me, because she thought I was kidding. While I didn`t cry on the surface, inside I was weeping. But outwardly I made a joke out of the situation. So humor has always been my shield against the slings and arrows. I turn them into something satiric.

[When asked if he is afraid to be type-cast as a tough guy after Alien: Resurrection (1997)]: I don`t bear any label. I perform very extreme characters, but at the same time men with an enormous goodness. Take for example the Hercules from Cité des enfants perdus, La (1995), One, he is a child in an adult body; One is pure, simple and innocent. My character in "Beauty and the Beast" (1987) had an enormous generosity, far from this world; the Beast was too good to be real. It`s true that I hardly play ordinary people due to my appearance, anyway I am not a captive of any register, I don`t systematically play tough and not very bright people. I congratulate myself for my varied filmography and for being able to do all roles.

I think there are a lot of technocrats in the business who would much rather work with just wheels and gears and machinery. Those things interest them more than humanity and I wish them the best of luck.

I lost 90 pounds and my blood pressure went down to a normal level and the salt in my urine disappeared. And that was when I had to make the transition from fat character actor to thin character actor.

Yeah, it`s nice to get paid for therapy rather than having to pay $240 an hour for it.

The great thing about arriving at this age is that I don`t even care about my career anymore.

I was not dealt the best physical hand in the world. My nose didn`t fit my mouth. My forehead didn`t fit my cheeks. And those are traditionally the years when a boy is judged primarily on his looks. So, consequently, I suffered from very low self- esteem. In a sense, I had a beast inside me. That beast was fear and insecurity. (on his childhood days)

[When asked what his idea of Hell is]: "Working at a job that you hate. Having a career and a life that you have no passion for. That`s hell."

[On being a director]: "I don`t like working with me. I would punch myself in the mouth if I had to take my direction."

I`ve never worked with a tail, that I can remember. But there`s so much I can`t remember.

I lost 90 pounds and my blood pressure went down to a normal level and the salt in my urine disappeared. And that was when I had to make the transition from fat character actor to thin character actor.

I don`t think anything is ever going to replace the human heart and what that generates in terms of performance.

I`m thankful to be breathing, on this side of the grass. Whatever comes, comes.

You draw on your own childhood every time you tee it up as an actor.

I will not do a role that I don`t think I can do, that I`m not interested in, where there`s no humanity, that doesn`t have any kind of handle for me at all because I know I`ll just stink the joint up.

I`ve done millions of mediocre movies. I`ve done way more than my fair share. You do what you gotta do. This is not heart surgery. I`m not curing cancer. I`m just trying to put my kids through school.

I will not do a role that I don`t think I can do, that I`m not interested in, where there`s no humanity, that doesn`t have any kind of handle for me at all because I know I`ll just stink the joint up.

[1990]: "People are doing sitcoms on stage rather than theater. You go to the theater, and it`s as if you were watching a sitcom at 8:30 on Channel 4."

I think there are a lot of technocrats in the business who would much rather work with just wheels and gears and machinery. Those things interest them more than humanity and I wish them the best of luck.

[On Guillermo del Toro]: "It seems as though we are like brothers. After knowing the guy for five minutes, it was one of these instances, where you felt, that you`ve known him for twenty-five years. This instantaneous friendship and recognition. Very very similar way of viewing the world. And then we found, that working with each other, there was a real simpatico. And I think you could even say, that we are alter egos for one another. Like if he was and actor he would be me and if I was a filmmaker I would be him. We seem to be trying to make the same statement in the world."

I just think that there are those people that their resolve is strengthened by what it is that`s keeping them down, and there are some people that will buckle under it. You never know which one is which until you get into the eighth or ninth round of the fight.

I just think that there are those people that their resolve is strengthened by what it is that`s keeping them down, and there are some people that will buckle under it. You never know which one is which until you get into the eighth or ninth round of the fight.