64 Quotes by Tony Shalhoub

I've been so fortunate throughout my career, when I was doing theater - more theater than anything else - and when I was doing films, that I got a chance just to do a broad range of things.

I did some acting in high school and then a little more in college, and it just was the thing that I felt that I wanted to do more than anything else. And then I was fortunate enough to audition for and get into Yale Drama School right after college, and I spent three years there.

'Longtime Companion' was really the first movie that I know of that addressed the problem of AIDS. This was back in the '80s that we did this.

I've been lucky that even when I was younger, just because of my look or whatever, I was afforded the opportunity or called on to try. 'Can you do this Hispanic character?' 'Can you do this Italian character?' 'Can you do this Jewish-American character?' I just had to develop a facility for their accents.

Before I did any television or film, I did years and years of theater. Television and film stuff, even though it went on for a good, healthy number of years, almost felt like a diversion from theater.

I try to do other characters that are different from Monk, obviously, because I'd like to be remembered for more than just that.

I'm drawn to that period, the '50s.

I get the opportunity to play all different ethnicities and not get stereotyped or locked into one. It's been a tremendous advantage, I think.

I started out in the theater when I was a young actor, so I've always tried to move from one medium to the other.