Paul Dano

The hardest thing about working with your partner is that the work starts to become first.

I really don't want to go to work every day convincing myself of what I'm saying. I want the material to make me a better actor; then I try to return the favor to the material.

One thing you notice is, there's a lot of people with raw talent, and then there's people who take that talent and work hard.

There's a lot of people that I would love to work with. There's a lot of different kinds of parts I wanna play. As your career progresses, you hope that you get some more opportunity or some more choice.

I like a restaurant called Bruci, and there's some really nice people who work there and good food. They change their menu a lot, so maybe that's what keeps me coming back. I never know what I'm going to get.

Robert De Niro's sort of like a surfer: he doesn't really force anything. So if he catches the wave, or something spills out - to watch a guy be a force at what he does. He has a good worth ethic.

Listening to hard rock on the subway doesn't work for me, especially modern hard rock. Driving in L.A. helped me to understand the appeal of that music.

Spring and fall in New York are the best seasons here to get out and about. I like the little park in Dumbo between the Manhattan and Brooklyn bridge. I like Prospect Park.

I do like the idea of consequence and how our actions play themselves out, but I am completely scared of knowing what the future would be like. I would never go near a fortune teller, even though it's probably not even real. I just don't wanna know.

I think the idea is to try and understand everything about the characters and where the character is coming from, from their point of view, why they say what they do. And not, 'Oh, but I would never say that. Why does the character say that?' But then making it as personal as possible.