Jon Bernthal Quotations

I did come to L.A. to try to get on TV and get in front of a camera, so I could have a stage career in New York.

I come from athletics and I have a pretty big boxing background, so I never really shy away or get nervous about the physical rigors of filmmaking.

I think so many great artists are flocking to LA because the downtown art scene is so vibrant, there is cheap living and you can really flourish as an artist there. There is an unbelievably supportive and really smart, talented theatre audience in LA full of young, hungry, vibrant people. It's something that sort of makes me think of what New York must have been like in its downtown theater scene in the 1980s - before my time.

We all come from different levels, and I think every human has their own relationship to violence, athletic violence and fighting.

Fighting really does reveal everything to the other guy. It's not just about who can beat up to or who's tougher, it's who bullies who and who goes easy on who. You change from opponent, so it's about how you deal with a challenge and how you deal with a guy who you can handle easily.

I wanted to be kicked and hit and bruised up and beaten. It became something that was an absolutely necessary part of every day for me.

I think that, just like the art scene and the music scene is exploding in LA - I mean, let's face it: if you want to be an artist you cannot live in New York anymore because it is too expensive

I went to school to play sports, but I got involved in theatre in college kind of by mistake. I ended up taking an acting class almost just to get rid of an arts requirement, but I wound up in this wonderful acting class with this teacher named Alma Becker who really saved my life. I was just kind of this knucklehead kid from DC and I was in and out of trouble all of the time. I took a theatre class and she really discovered something in me and I absolutely fell in love with it.

I hope that I would put whatever my political beliefs aside, and realize that my country's asked me to to something, and do it.

I think anytime a movie can inspire you to think and reflect and look at your life, it's a success.

I want people to think about everyone in their life, and their responsibilities to their friends, their families and their country.

People have different goals, when you start out making a movie. If the goal is darkness and destruction and despair, it's not like, "Hey, let's go to set, and then let's hit the bar afterwards. Let's jaunt into London and pick up some Chinese food." No, you go home from set and you go fight at the gym, and then you go to sleep. You stay in it. You never excuse yourself, you never take it easy on yourself, you never eat good food.

Some people that are heroes to some can be looked at by another group of people as villains. As far as a middle point, just speaking for myself, that's exactly what to avoid.

At the end of the day, it's a show [Daredevil ] not about a superhero, but it's about a man. Hopefully, that's what we're doing with The Punisher, as well. It's an enormous honor to play this character. It's a character that's quite iconic and very important to a lot of people.

You've never seen anything in the Marvel universe that's as grounded, as gritty, as authentic, and as raw as what these guys did last year [in Season 1 of Daredevil]. What an amazing place to bring this character into, to attempt to up the stakes and to make it more dangerous. Hopefully, we were able to do that. But as far as those movies, my concern is this show.

I've never been a big gore guy.

I think any time you can go after an audience that isn't built in, that's the job.

If you can figure out how to get paid to do something you love, that's the dream.

Bugs have always loved me.

I did come to L.A. to try to get on TV and get in front of a camera, so I could have a stage career in New York.

I think that for a lot of actors - especially American actors - to get line readings and to be told and have your director literally act out the part for you is sort of discouraging in a way. It's a very Eastern European thing to do - a lot of directors that I worked with in Russia did that as well. And, I never took that as an insult, as many actors tend to do. To me, I think it's just offering a certain energy - offering their flavor - and, instead of trying to sort of decode and communicate it to you, they just show you their flavor of what it should be.

I mean, I hate when actors talk about how hard their job is. It's ridiculous, because we have the best job in the world.

I played baseball in college, and then I went to Russia to study acting and played some pro ball over there.

I played sports in high school and in college.

The goal is just to try to get better and better, and the only way that makes sense to do that is to work with the best people. Surround yourself with the best artists and learn from them, and try to sink your teeth into the best material possible.

I'm not a big shopper.

My time in Moscowmade a man of memade me an artistthere was a reality and a brutality of life that I think was very important, as a young American, for me to see.

I think it helps, as an actor, to never know when you're going to get that next script and you're done.