Rachel McAdams

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

I’ll put on a punk rock T-shirt, a ’50s style skirt, and a pair of flip-flops. I like to mesh a whole bunch of things together.

Mean girls are always going to exist, and you can’t fight them. Don’t lose yourself in going along with them just to hide, because you won’t feel good about that either. But there are people like you out there, trust me. When I was in school, I felt like I was the only one, and I got to college, and a whole new world opened up for me, and I’ve never, ever felt that way again. I did theater outside of school, and I think that was my salvation as well. I found people that had the same interests and respected each other. It exists, and keep trying to find it, because it’s worth it not to succomb.

I’ve been very lucky so far. I haven’t had any bad experiences as far as fan encounters. They don’t really recognize me. I think it has to do with my hair. I change it all the time. I like changing my hair color and sometimes it’s just not for a role. Usually, I just do it for me.

Most of the time, people will just pass me by, or if they do realize, they’ll say something like, “My girlfriend said that was you, but I didn’t believe her.”

Yeah. I still live in Canada, so it’s not quite the same. And when I’m in L.A., I’m in a car; you don’t have the contact with the public. It’s not so bad. It’s still pretty much the same. I still feel pretty normal-ish.

As strange as movie making is, doing love scenes for the first time with someone you’ve never even said hello to does work in terms of having a fresh quality to a relationship.

I did (training in) tennis, ballet, swing dancing, piano, art class and etiquette. I also did French dialect, but then it was mixing me up with my Southern dialect, so we stuck to Southern!

Well I always wanted to be Dolly Parton when I was a little girl. I was obsessed with her.

My ability to turn good news into anxiety is rivaled only by my ability to turn anxiety into chin acne.

Spring is nature’s way of saying, “Let’s party!”

I don’t like Tommy on Broadway at all. I like the music, I’m pleased with Pete’s success but I don’t like what they’ve done to it.

There’s no point regretting things. If you can’t do the time, don’t do the crime. Life’s too short to worry about things I’ve said.

So it’s an aging product that’s decreasing in popularity and yet somehow it just can’t stop making money. It’s basically the agricultural equivalent of U2.

[on dual careers and marriage] Marriage and family come before everything. You don’t want to make a movie at the cost of your relationship.

Even when I was at ‘SNL,’ I didn’t do impersonations. I always wanted to be the kind of person who could do them – I always thought they were the coolest thing on the show – but I didn’t have any experience.

It’s good to get information and feedback from your fans on the Internet. But a lot of it is downright mean. There are three or four guys who say they’re Vince Neil and people come to the shows because these guys promise them tickets, and when there’s no tickets there, they get mad at the band. That kind of stuff bums me out.

And, you know, politics aside, the success of Sarah Palin and women like her is good for all women – except, of course -those who will end up, you know, like, paying for their own rape ‘kit ‘n’ stuff, But for everybody else, it’s a win-win. Unless you’re a gay woman who wants to marry your partner of 20 years – whatever. But for most women, the success of conservative women is good for all of us. Unless you believe in evolution. You know – actually, I take it back. The whole thing’s a disaster.

The sweetest thing a guy said is that I look pretty with or without makeup.

It’s a lot harder to do an ensemble because your energy is going in so many different places, and you have to cover everybody. You have to sort of split your attention.

If people don’t like me for whatever I do, for being me, then that’s too bad. I don’t want to change to be something that I’m not for other people to like me.