James Badge Dale

Kids will tease you for just about anything.

I got beat up by the comic-book kids when I was younger! They were cooler than me. Talk about levels of geekdom, I was a couple rungs below the kids who read comic books. Yeah. Not so cool, man.

I always like playing the bad guys. They have more fun!

I grew up in a crazy, gypsy-like household of actors, dancers and loony Broadway people. It was their way of life, and I didn't know anything else.

The older I get, the more vegetables I eat. I can't stress that more. Eating healthy really affects my work. You not only need to be physically prepared, but mentally and spiritually.

I grew up in a family of actors. I grew up onstage. The choice for me wasn't, 'Do I want to be an actor or not?' I always felt like that's just ingrained in you, the need to perform. The choice was, 'Do you want to do this professionally or not?'

I was really lucky that, through my 20s, I got to work with some amazing people, and I tried to sit back and watch and learn.

My experience as a young actor on network television was that I couldn't make it work. I was drowning as an actor.

I want to show up to work and take risks. I don't ever want to play it safe.

You want to work with good people. When you're working with good people, it frees you up. There's nothing worse, as an actor, to show up and then feel like you have to protect yourself somehow because you don't feel like you're in good hands.