Rachel McAdams

I once made a (it was supposed to be a 30-minute) bean salad that took me like 6 hours

I was not popular in high school, I know every actress says that, but really, I was a big geek.

I’m waiting for them to make ‘Thundercats’. I would love to be Cheetara.

I look like an angel, but I can play the bitch.

[on which film had a bigger impact on her career – “The Notebook” or “Mean Girls”] For me personally it would be The Notebook. That was something I was dying to do when I read the script. I worked with so many amazing people and people responded so well to that film, and continue to. In terms of an impact on my career, that was significant. Mean Girls speaks to a really large audience, which is the kids and they eat that stuff up. I don’t know. It’s hard to choose.

You know, I have some issues. But I just love to play different characters all the time, and I try not to repeat myself too much.

Some of the best times in my life happened under the influence of drugs… I’d still be doing it if I could make good judgement calls. I’d still be doing it if I didn’t blow up to the size of an aircraft hangar, because it was a great time.

Definitely tougher to be vulnerable. As a woman in the industry, you try so hard to remain strong and to not let your guard down. And once you let the walls down and let people see that you were a regular person who has feelings, sometimes people take advantage of that. I think that applies for everyone. It’s always a little bit nerve-racking to just completely let your guard down because you just don’t know if people are going to appreciate it. And then if they don’t appreciate it, you can feel like you did it in vain.

To play June, I had an immediate connect with her background and culture. We grew up with the same religion and shared a lot of the same values of family and spirituality. But I was really so inspired by what a modern woman she was.

When it comes down to the music, it’s just you and the microphone. It’s not you and the record execs.

Don’t waste your energy trying to educate or change opinions; go over, under, through, and opinions will change organically when you’re the boss. Or they won’t. Who cares? Do your thing and don’t care if they like it.

I’m not one for parties and stuff like that. I get a bit nervous around lots of people. Being invisible is what I really enjoy. That I find quite entertaining.

Apparently, I think it’s Columbia Records has Betty Wand’s name on all of the stuff that I did, too, and that’s made me very, very unhappy.

I don’t now what situation they came from and I don’t know what they were offered to go somewhere else. It’s the times now, There’s not a any loyalty for anyone or anything – a whole lot. Wherever the money’s at, that’s where they’re going, so I don’t blame them. They’ve got just a few years to get it done and if they don’t get it done then, then they aren’t going to get it done.

You just have to play every scene honestly and forget about a reaction and what the audience is going to think. I think the more seriously you take something, the more funny it might be.

I don’t drink, I don’t take drugs, I don’t smoke.

There’s no substitute to being successful on an actual chart.

I think it’s really finding that belief in yourself, where you just have it no matter what’s going on, no matter what anyone else says. I think that’s the challenge, is to really have that belief in yourself.

I’m just incredibly fortunate that my eyes and ears have been opened. I have to be honest with myself and remove as much of the repetition and fakery as is humanly possible. To soothe the savage heart, we have to repeat ourselves sometimes – that’s entertainment.

I don’t fit the mold. In this country, success usually happens when you are 22 and six feet tall. Clearly, by asking that question they are kind of letting me know that I am an aberration.

I don’t want to go to another rollercoaster ride of a movie. If I want that, I’ll go to Magic Mountain. I’m really interested in the young directors that are doing different things in cinema. I think the movies people will hold onto are the Rushmore (1998)s and the Being John Malkovich (1999)s. Those are the kind of films I want to do; that’s what I’m passionate about.