Quotes By Meryl Streep

Every single decision I make about what material I do, what I'm putting out in the world, is because of my children.

There are wonderfully talented actresses. It's a really rich field. There isn't as rich a field of material.

I have a very busy life, and not many people who have a career and four kids go out a lot to the movies.

Personality is immediately apparent, from birth, and I don't think it really changes.

We are who we're going to be when we're very old, and when we're very old we are who we were when we were 8.

I always feel like I can't do it, that I can't go through with a movie. But then I do go through with it after all.

Having been let out of the barn once, I know I wouldn't be happy if I were home all the time.

I didn't have any confidence in my beauty when I was young. I felt like a character actress, and I still do.

All that attention to the perfect lighting, the perfect this, the perfect that, I find terribly annoying.

I'm older. There's some sort of seniority. As a matter of fact, the seniority ebbs as you get older.

I had this sort of idolatry for certain actors who preceded me, people who inspired me, so I'm honored to be that way for young actors.

Chris Cooper is one of my favorite actors in the world. I've seen him in most everything he's done.

I'm a pain in the ass to all of the costume designers with whom I work because I have very strong feelings about the subject.

For me, clothes are kind of character; I don't follow fashion or understand trends.

Expensive clothes are a waste of money.

There's no road map on how to raise a family: it's always an enormous negotiation.

You just have to keep on doing what you do. It's the lesson I get from my husband; he just says, Keep going. Start by starting.

Interestingly, young people don't come to you for advice. Especially the ones who are related to you.

Enough people write about me every day without even interviewing me.

Some people are filled by compassion and a desire to do good, and some simply don't think anything's going to make a difference.

I'm all over the place.

People say, When you have children, everything changes. But maybe things are awakened that were already there.

The interesting thing about being a mother is that everyone wants pets, but no one but me cleans the kitty litter.

I'm curious about other people. That's the essence of my acting. I'm interested in what it would be like to be you.

I have a holistic need to work and to have huge ties of love in my life. I can't imagine eschewing one for the other.

I couldn't care less about fashion. If I had taken any clothes home, they would have remained in my closet for the rest of their existence.

Show business has been really, really good to me because I can work and take a lot of time off, and I'm extremely undisciplined person.

Acting is not about being someone different. It's finding the similarity in what is apparently different, then finding myself in there.

You can't get spoiled if you do your own ironing.

How you first meet the public is how the industry sees you. You can't argue with them. That's their perception.