henryfonda:

(on his first acting role) So I find myself in rehearsals so self conscious, cause I was a terribly shy, self-conscious young man but I remember – I remember my head was down like this and everybody was sort of sitting on a circle reading and I finally raised my eyes I thought everybody was looking at me, you know? And I raised my eyes enough to realize they weren’t all looking at me – they had their own problem. They were looking at their own script, looking at the director. So eventually I raise my eyes enough to look around and I looked up there and here’s this grid that went up there, way up and a lot of ropes. I’ve never seen anything like this! And those are the things that I remember of the experience of playing Ricky in You and I. With the grid and a lot of ropes: was the smell of makeup, was the sound when the curtain was down before the curtain went up, when you were in place, you’ve been called to place, and you’re in place and you can hear the audience, the buzzer and then the stage manager gives the signal to the electrician who starts to bring the house lights down and that buzz buzz buzz from the audience starts to get quiet. I remember those things. I get emotional remembering it! God! This is what happened today! I didn’t wanna be an actor! 

Happy Birthday, Henry Jaynes Fonda (b. May 16, 1905)