As an actor, it easy to be so self-critical, saying to yourself, 'Am I good enough? Am I good looking enough? Am I smart enough?'

I don't usually read self-help books, but I read a great book by a guy called Wayne Dyer: 'The Power of Intention,' which I loved.

I like a deep sports massage - a casual beating up. I try to get them whenever I can, usually more if I'm getting in shape for a role.

The great thing about theater is that you have so much time to prepare, and to fail, before presenting it to the public. In film, the high-wire act seems to be that much farther up, and the net seems to be less there.

I don't think there's anything less attractive than a man over-dyeing things on his face, so I'm going to try, for as long as I can, to age as my male forefathers before me. My father started getting grays when he was in his 30s, as did my grandfather before him, so I don't want to look perpetually young.

I really like the ritual of shaving. I like getting the perfect brush and finding the right sandalwood soap. The act of shaving, though, is not fun. I like beards and the ease of them.

Whether you're scared of getting into a relationship; or taking the new job; or a confrontation - you have to size fear up.

I think the most dangerous word in the English language is 'should.' 'I should have done this.' Or 'I should do that.' 'Should' implies responsibility. It connotes demand. Which is just not the case. Life ebbs and flows.

It's really interesting that, in 'The Avengers,' the character that people relate to is The Hulk, and I think the reason why they relate to The Hulk is because he's fragile and human and faulty.

For me, I love exploring ideas and throwing stuff against the wall and seeing what fits, and if I had a really nice collaborative team around me who could deal with the more day-to-day minutia, that would be fun. And directing sometime in the future and writing... yeah, I can see that all in my future. But I can be incredibly lazy.

Growing up in a family of actors, what's great about it is that they're very supportive and they understand what it's like to be an actor - the rejections, the highs and lows... and having a common language with them is great because you have shorthand speech.

Mediocrity scares me. It's the fear of not being as good as you want to be. If you give over to that fear, it will sabotage you. As much as I can, I try to use that fear to guide me.

At the end of the day, you have a job to do, and if you don't do your job, you're going to get fired. You just have to kind of put your head down and do it.

I have worked hard to get where I am.

Anytime you take on a character... you just have to find the parts of the character that you can understand.

From Drew Barrymore to Robert Downey Jr., there's a long list of people who have faced their troubles, wildly overcome them, and succeeded.

I always enjoyed singing; I played guitar.

It's so rare to get all of your muscles firing at once. That's what I look for in any role.

I was never much of a musical theater guy, but I have so much more respect for the art form, the physical exertion of doing eight shows on Broadway a week, I cannot even fathom it.

You see Justin Bieber and Robert Pattinson, what they go through, and dude, that's not as exciting as it looks.

Musical theater is great; you get painted up, you get to play princesses and witches, and you sing. The joy alone of that can really carry a lot.

Action films unfortunately don't let you spend a lot of time sitting. So you don't have much time to create something indelible or unique.

I have such awful skin; it doesn't matter what magic serum they think they're putting on - I'll usually break out.

I had a job at this French restaurant, and I hated it. I don't like serving; I don't like getting people ketchup.

The things that motivated me at 21 don't suffice. Which is scary but really liberating in a way. It's taken me a long time to feel like, instead of being invited to the party with a bunch of people I don't know, that I actually deserve to be here.

When I was a younger actor, I was pretty much solely motivated by validation. I just wanted to be told I was good and handsome and a part of the gang. It was pretty simple animal-social stuff. I don't care as much about those things anymore.

There have been, like, three auditions in my life where I feel like I'm in a 'Saturday Night Live' skit.

One thing that I do find really sexy is a girl who's good at crossword puzzles.

You can be many miles away and press a button on a keyboard, and it can cause devastation.

Therapy's like going to the gym.

The mass audience doesn't want to see you if you aren't perfect. If you don't look a certain way, if you don't have big pecs and great skin and the perfect eyes. And it's unfortunate, because kids are growing up with body image dysmorphia because not everyone is represented on the screen.

I like a fragrance that you notice and want to find out more about - get a bit closer. I don't want to walk in and be jolted awake by someone's smell.

If you had no real training, if you hadn't spent years and years studying a martial art, how would you kill the bad guy?

My father calls acting 'a state of permanent retirement with short spurts of work.'

I never really thought about myself being in really big movies at all. In fact, I always though I'd do, I don't know, smaller movies is not quite the right word, but more character-oriented, dramatic things. I took myself a little bit seriously.

The first audition I went out on was because my father was on an audition for a TV show called the 'Gilmore Girls,' and that kind of snowballed a lot of stuff in my life.

I think we just live in a time of the selfie. So there's a sense that everyone's uniqueness and importance on this planet should be displayed and reveled in, and that there's kind of a piece of glory for everyone.

For me growing up, Christmas time was always the most fantastic, exciting time of year, and you'd stay up until three in the morning. You'd hear the parents wrapping in the other room but you knew that also, maybe, they were in collusion with Santa Claus.

Film is just a different version of what we did round the campfire when we were Neanderthals. We tell stories so people can learn things and relativise things.

Dating someone on the opposite end of the happy spectrum teaches you an incredible amount of patience.

I think the first thing that I saw on IMAX was 'The Avengers.' The scope and the size of it are pretty neat, I will say that.

I cry all the time - at work, at the shrink's, with my lady. 'The Notebook' killed me. 'Up' destroyed me.

I'm definitely of the 'less is more' mentality, and what I really appreciate is that fragrance is chemical, and it changes with your body throughout the day. It's a very deeply personal thing. One smell on one person isn't the same on another, and I appreciate the uniqueness of that experience.

Those big films are scary things. There's so much money behind those things. There's that hype. You enter a machine.

I feel prematurely old. I'm actually having this major belated quarter-life crisis. I'm turning 30 in a couple of weeks. I've been thinking a lot about mortality. A lot about what I'm going to do with my life and how to enjoy it. One of the things I'm going to work on is being more spontaneous, letting go, embracing the beauty of come-what-may.

For me, work is one thing, and my life is another.

Generally speaking, the more money that's involved in anything, the more people are expecting and hoping that it's not going to fail.

We come from fallible parents who were kids once, who decided to have kids and who had to learn how to be parents. Faults are made and damage is done, whether it's conscious or not. Everyone's got their own 'stuff,' their own issues, and their own anger at Mom and Dad. That is what family is. Family is almost naturally dysfunctional.

I'm an actor, but I am an awful liar.

Not a fan of spiders. I saw the movie 'Arachnophobia,' which was single-handedly rated in the top three worst choices of my life.