Quotes

The great thing about film is you start and finish. It's a journey that lasts so long, TV lasts a long time.

The part I enjoy about acting is just having that imagination, taking your mind to a place that you wouldn't normally necessarily go to.

[on her film Sugar & Spice (2001)] Huge party, from the day we started until we wrapped in Minneapolis. We'd all go to coffee in the morning and we became best friends. We were so excited to be in an all-girl film. It was one big shopping spree. They put us in this hotel across from a shopping mall, and we were often late for work!

No matter what the character is, I just say to myself "If I, Melissa George, was in that situation, how would I react?" and once you do that you can just go for it, and hopefully the performance comes through.

I don't need credibility from my country any more, I just need them all to be quiet. If they have nothing intelligent to say, please don't speak to me any more. I'd rather be having a croissant and an espresso in Paris or walking my French bulldog in New York City.

I've never spoken out about it because I have to be the loyal good Aussie, who goes away and comes home.

But I'm a really hard-working woman and people have to respect me for what I've done ... my next call will be to Home and Away (1988) to ask them to pay me because nobody does more promotion for that f***ing show than me.

[on her getting back to shape pretty quick after giving birth] This is a good message for women: If you've had a baby, really take time out [and breastfeed]. Not only does it shrink your uterus back into shape very fast, it also keeps a layer of fat around your midriff, which you need to feed. You do not diet when you're breastfeeding. And don't eat for two. That's what a doctor in Paris told me: 'In France, we eat for one, not two.'

I come home and pay my taxes and work - I'm very much a proud Australian. When all this came out, my father called me and said, "That's my girl". He's an amazing man - he raised three very strong girls. That's what I'm defined by - not a payroll I was on in 1993. [Home and Away (1988)] was a difficult time for me. I was very young, I was taken away from my family, barely 16. I was working 20 hours a day, getting paid very little. It was hard. Since then, I've bought my own properties, become an independent woman. And I've made Australian productions every year.

[on her split from previous husband, Chilean director Claudio Dabed] I was the one who went out to work, I was the one who did every single thing in the relationship.

[on watching the heart operation of a 72-year-old man at a hospital in Paris in the lead up to her new role on NBC medical drama, Heartbeat (2016)] Usually you're up in the observation deck but this time the doctor said 'scrub in and come and assist me.' And so I stood on my feet, next to the surgeon, for almost eight hours and the patient was prepped and when they pulled out that saw, I looked at him and said: 'you're not going to cut him open are you?' and he just said, 'well how else am I going to get to the heart?' And it was, you know, spectacular - it made me want to cry. I waited until they closed him up, then had to rush home and shower because I was covered in bone dust and then I had to go from there to the Christian Dior fashion show. I sat there and looked at everyone in the front row and I could see their hearts beating through their shirts. Hours before I had a heart in my hand with this doctor and I thought 'I know what every single one of you looks like on the inside'. If teenagers could watch open-heart surgery and see the beauty of a heart ... to know, if you look after that heart, eating well and exercising, every teenager, every person should see that so they know (hearts) are the most beautiful part of your anatomy ... it's pretty amazing.