Doubt is the middle position between knowledge and ignorance. It encompasses cynicism but also genuine questioning.

I don’t necessarily need Hollywood.

I’ve always believed that if you are precise in your thoughts, it’s not the lines you say that are important – it’s what exists between the lines. What I’m compelled by most is that transparency...

I love to be surprised.

Editing yourself is like an irksome coin toss. You’ve got to strip yourself of super ego and operate from the id. Maybe I’ve got my Freud mixed up. It’s just hard to trade a beauty...

I’m part wood nymph. I require mountains and warm, dense patches of moss to thrive.

It’s true: I don’t remember what life was like before parenthood.

I think God gave us senses of humor, and we should use them.

I have the best husband a wife could possibly have. He’s the best father my children could have.

In these times, in this harsh, rude, warring world that we live in, where most of the bloodshed is ‘My god is greater than your god,’ and we’re fighting in the name of our god,...

The Ukrainian community is tight-knit by nature.

I think I always try to be accommodating and open and available and proving for my director. I love to give as many takes as they want. I love to give them as many choices...

When I look at female characters, I want to recognize myself in them: my trials, my tribulations as a mother, as a lover, as a daughter.

It’s a very different thing, religion and faith. Religion is man-made, it’s man-regulated. And faith, you can define God as you wish. But I think they’re two different things.

I don’t have a caustic sense of humor. What I find funny, that humor comes from a much gentler place.

I think all religions can agree on certain definitions of God and concepts of God, like God being the god of love, the great ‘I am’ energy.

I look for struggle in the roles I choose – struggle and perseverance.

There’s no wrong way to experience a film.

The more people know about you, the more face-time you get in the media, the harder your job becomes to create a character in whom people suspend disbelief.

Offers come all the time, but I’m pretty particular. I really have to be wowed by a character I encounter in a script, or a storyline. I really do need to feel inspiration, otherwise I’m...

As an actor, you’re sort of the court-appointed lawyer for the character.

Am I ambitious? I used to be afraid of that word but now I think ambition is a good thing.

I think the worst thing that can happen to a good actor is fame.

Sometimes I attract roles that are necessary either for personal growth or enlightenment.

Whether we call it religion or faith, we all battle for a balanced integrated soul.

Working with children is a whole other ball game. They’re like little animals. You have to keep the camera turned on them all the time. Sometimes it takes a 41-minute take to get one sentence...

There are women who make things better, there are women who change things, there are women who make things happen, who make a difference. I want to be one of those women.

I didn’t grow up watching film but as a Ukrainian-American, music and stories and dance are crucial.

The biggest research of all when I do a character is self-examination. You look at yourself and you ask, ‘How am I similar to this person and how am I different?’

I’m hooked on Polanski’s films, his psychological thrillers. I love ‘Rosemary’s Baby,’ I love ‘Repulsion.’

We are all seekers in some way. There are those of us who think they have all the answers and there are those of us who may never get an answer.

I’ve never felt the breath of God – you can take that statement literally or metaphorically – more than when I was yearning for a personal, intimate connection to something bigger than me.

I hate being manipulated by song. Don’t tell me what I should be feeling. I don’t want cellos or violins to be telling me that I should be bawling right now.

Normally, I rely heavily on my director to massage me out of my actor comfort zones.

I grew up in a Ukrainian Catholic-turned-Christian household, and that is my family’s faith.

Do I pray? Yes. Prayer is very important to me.

I’m just someone who marvels at God.

I love Saturday nights with my best friend and a big bowl of pasta, wanting a good scare, something that will say, ‘Listen, your life is not as bad as this. Your life can be...

My father instilled in me – of utmost importance and innate in me is the yearning to determine for myself – to define God, to define holiness for myself.

The limelight is a tricky place, because you can’t believe what’s going on around you. You stop observing. You stop perceiving. You stop extending yourself, and you become isolated.

My only real advice to Oscar nominees is, ‘If you haven’t actually seen a competitor’s film, don’t fib and say you have and blow smoke up their wahooziewhatsits.’ Always best to be frank and tell...

I think that films about faith made for faith-based communities have a certain tactic.

I just can’t feel lukewarm about a character. I either despise her, admire her, or don’t understand her and want to understand her.

I’ve never graced the cover of a fashion magazine.

I am drawn to intimate, often uncomfortable portraits of a woman persevering and awakening.

You earn very little money on independent films and I’m the provider for my home, so I do have to think of taking one for the accountant time and again and that means studio pictures.

There are some times when I think acting can be a noble profession. And when those rare roles come along, like ‘Down to the Bone,’ you have the opportunity to be of service.

Ruminants are a perfectly normal thing to possess when you live in upstate New York. It’s just moving scenery. It’s kind of like the equivalent of Great Danes. It’s the way you keep your grass...

We take a lot for granted as second wave feminists, what our mothers and aunts did for us.

I just hate one-dimensional portrayals of religion; it’s too cheap and easy to do, and ignores the nuances that go into having a belief system.