Chapter 1: An Actor Avoids

The Kominsky Method 1×1

Sandy Kominsky: Acting. So what is acting? I mean, when an actor acts, what is he or she... or they... actually doing? Well, on one level, the answer is simple. They're making believe. They are pretending. But on a... on a much deeper level, we need to ask ourselves... what is really happening.
     Well, you need to ask me. I think I'm the only one here who doesn't have a roommate.
     What's really happening... and I want you to listen carefully... What's really happening is that the actor is playing... God.
     Because, after all, what does God do? God creates. God says "Here is a world," and bam! That world exists. God says, "Here's life," and bam again! Life happens. God says, "Here's death," and boom! Darkness. The darkness returns.
     So what does this mean to us? How do we take this information and bring it into our work? The answer, my dear colleagues, is that, like God, we must love our creations. We must imbue them with life, with character, with hope and dreams and fatal flaws, and then... Then... we must let them go. Because in the end... true love... God's love... is letting go.

Sandy Kominsky: Okay, love of character, not the pursuit of fame or money, is what separates the great actor, the true artist...

Sandy Kominsky: Um, I'm gonna have a Jack Daniel's on the rocks and a diet Dr Pepper with a straw.
Norman Newlander: I absolutely loathe the way you drink.
Sandy Kominsky: The Jack keeps me from killing myself, and the Pepper keeps me regular.

Sandy Kominsky: I did not want to get them sicker.
Mindy Kominsky: You were worried you might give the guy with brain cancer a case of the sniffles?
Sandy Kominsky: Yes. It's called common courtesy.

Sandy Kominsky: Yes, I'll admit to fearing a violent death, terrorism, tsunamis, what have you, but natural death from old age? No. No, not at all. I see that as my next great adventure.
Mindy Kominsky: Tsunamis? Really?
Sandy Kominsky: I've never been a strong swimmer.

Sandy Kominsky: And let us not forget that I will live on in my work... in my students. That's how I cheat death.

Lisa: You know, you didn't have to come all this way. I could've met you.
Sandy Kominsky: No, I'm old school. You pick a lady up for dinner and you return her safely home.
Lisa: That is so wonderfully archaic.
Sandy Kominsky: Well, that's my rap name, Wonderfully Archaic.

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