Tobey Maguire

Tobey: I don't want to give my personal life away to whoever decides to pick up a magazine. I'm not a zoo animal on display. Some people obviously welcome that, creating certain behaviour so that a particular type of press attention never fades. But it's not for me.

Tobey: (on attention-seeking celebrities) I look at people in gossip magazines and I can't imagine what it's like. It seems some of them bring it on themselves - it fuels them. I've always avoided things that would put me out there.

Lukas Haas: (on Tobey's new daughter) He's an amazing guy... He'll be an amazing dad in so many ways.

Tobey: (There's no place like home!) I'll go do films for three or four months and then I can't wait to go home to LA. And I complain about LA left and right, but then I always end up wanting to go home, you know?

Tobey: I started working around eighth grade. I remember doing a Doritos commercial where there were four days in a row of eating them, and I will tell you, I have not eaten many Doritos since.

Tobey: I know there's all this talk about my charisma deficit and I have to admit that I'm not a wild, in-your-face actor. It's not my nature to be flashy or extroverted and that's why I see it as a great challenge to me as an actor to be able to play against type and shake up people's perceptions of me.

Tobey: I have no illusions at all about being a sex symbol. None of my former girlfriends ever thought of me that way, and I don't have any packs of women chasing me down the street like a Brad Pitt or someone like that.

Tobey: Every actor has to establish a presence that not only fits the overall needs of the story but allows him to interact with other actors in a credible and meaningful way. Every actor wants to work under conditions and with material that enables them to create and use their craft.

Tobey: All the people throughout my life who were naysayers pissed me off. But they've all given me a fervor; an angry ambition that cannot be stopped-and I look forward to finding a therapist and working on that.

Tobey (On losing and gaining weight for roles) I put weight back on-I don't know exactly how much. I started putting it on the last couple of weeks of Seabiscuit. Gaining weight could sound like fun to some people, but it's not. I had to twice as much of the same special food, and it's stuff that I don't particularly enjoy-and then I had to work out all the time [to bulk up].

Tobey: [jokingly] I had to lose 15 pounds to be Spider-Man, had to pack on 25 for Seabiscuit and now I have to lose that for Spider-Man 2! Why can't I do a movie where I'm normal?

Tobey: I never read comic books. I was just never a comic book fan, so it's not like I ever dreamed about playing Spider Man.

Tobey: I don't like excessive vanity. I like a girl who looks good and has a decent sense of style, but who is comfortable with herself and isn't too caught up with her look.

Tobey: You're asking me to give insight into my personality or my philosophy of acting. I just don't think that deeply about it. What it means when I do this or that - I don't know. That's coming outside of myself. I prefer to live my life from inside of me, rather than come outside.

Tobey: I think fame is a really complicated thing. It can be a great challenge to handle the difficult parts of it and strengthen your character so you don't get affected in a negative way by it. And I'm scared and excited and hesitant and anxious. I'm conflicted about it, truly.