Clark Gregg quotes:

New York is the perfect place for a film festival because there's already so much energy and life here, and New Yorkers love movies.

I was really sad after 'The Avengers' when I realized I was not going to have a part in 'Thor 2' or 'Captain America: The Winter Soldier.' But I'm not arguing with my fantastic plane and my really cool car.

Agent Coulson takes the work very seriously. He certainly has some fun with Spider-Man and the others, but he takes each of their tasks, including when they get involved with the drama club, way too seriously. The adventures that they come up with are really exciting.

The Avengers' is exciting on the level 'The Matrix' or 'Indiana Jones' was when I was kid. I think it will be timeless.

Joss Whedon and all the writers of 'Iron Man' and 'Thor' found a way to keep Coulson saying something that keeps you guessing. I'm really lucky because a lot of people play agents and don't get nearly as much fun stuff to do.

'The Avengers' is exciting on the level 'The Matrix' or 'Indiana Jones' was when I was kid. I think it will be timeless.

The world of Ultimate Spider-Man is funny. I can't imagine a live-action film where he's Principal Coulson and dealing with some of the pranks from these guys.

I think about it, and I realize there's been some version of a Batman or Spiderman or Superman franchise since I was a boy, since before I was a boy.

I guess what we know about the Avengers is there's a reason why all of the heroes that we've been meeting, from Thor to Captain America - everybody - they need to work together.

I thought there would be more time in my trailer to write during 'Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D.,' but I seem to be always flying in a harness and conquering supervillains instead.

I'd be just another Marvel fan, only with a little bit bigger smile, when I would get the script and be like, "Oh, my gosh, Agent Coulson knows that?

The thing is, I love a great death scene - no good actor doesn't. Sorry, any actor, I should say.

When I moved out to Los Angeles to get some film and television work, and couldn't get any... I became a little isolated, a little terrified, and it's a good place to get writing, because you're so bored. So I wrote a few screenplays, and people notice those.

There's nobody who loves being around actors working more than David Mamet, especially actors bringing his tremendous dialogue to life. I've never seen a movie director who was happier to be directing a movie than Dave.

There was a day on the set of Iron Man where I said, "I remember some of this stuff. I definitely had some Iron Man books. But, S.H.I.E.L.D. is a little bit of a weak spot for me."

All the PG-13 superhero movies are depriving me of the gore that I need.

The great thing about Coulson is that he's a little bit like a party game, where the next person who gets ahold of him gets to write another sentence. I'm constantly learning more and more about the guy.

To go from Jon Favreau for Iron Man 1 and 2 to Kenneth Branagh for Thor and the very different world of Thor, it's about how to adapt to Coulson in a different setting and a different world while, at the same time, still have him be a part of the same world.

There's something about the superheroes and the idea behind their relationship with humans, whether it's a metaphor for the better part of ourselves, or the more flawed part of ourselves. So it seems to really be our own pop-culture version of Greek mythology.

I like anything Jennifer Lawrence is in. She's so beautiful.

I'm just an actor who happened to love these [Marvel] comics when I was a kid, and got to rediscover them.

I've never seen a movie director who was happier to be directing a movie than Dave [Mamet]. His sets, everyone who's ever been involved with one of them will tell you of the funnest, funniest sets you can be on.

I was an 'Ironman' fan. It was in the '70s. I definitely liked comics and drew a lot of panels on my notebook when I should have been studying - probably why I ended up in the arts.

Because I'm stern and scolding [the characters] sometimes, I'm sure I'll get a ton of grief.

When I got the episode where Spider-Man meets Aunt May (voiced by Misty Lee), it was another one of those things where I was like, "I can't believe I have a scene with Aunt May. That's just amazing to me." And they drew her a lot younger and hotter then the Aunt May that I remember.

When Marvel put together Ultimate Spider-Man and someone came up with the idea of having Principal Coulson, they said, "Do you want to do the voice?" I thought, "I have to do the voice!" Because I have a daughter and we watch some cartoons, I couldn't bear the idea of tuning in and hearing somebody else's voice.

I was a football player at college and dislocated my thumb. I was out for a bit and passed the theatre and saw some lovely drama students walking into an audition for 'Much Ado About Nothing' and thought: 'That's what I'll do when I recover.' I joined that production and was hooked.

I felt like people really do their best work when they're having a really good time and feel safe to push the envelope and make a jackass out of themselves.

When there wasn't a lot of work, I wrote a screenplay, 'What Lies Beneath,' which got noticed and got me more acting jobs. As I got more jobs, I was able to make my own films. That ethos of making my own work has provided me with a lot of opportunities.

I had worked in this New York theatre company for my first eight or nine years out of college, acting and directing there, and I'd begun to write a little bit.

I'm not secretly on the board of Marvel.

The technology actually seemed to come at just the right time to make the Hulk - Mark Ruffalo was really able to play both characters.

There's always changes in the way they do that in the cinematic universe. I think, with the S.H.I.E.L.D. 2.0, you're seeing some of the first ripples of those different points of view on what S.H.I.E.L.D. should be when it's rebuilt. I'm very, very curious to know which side Coulson will end up on in that struggle.

Speaking as Coulson, it's unclear. I feel like that are other formidable S.H.I.E.L.D. elements and they don't have Coulson's connection to some of these people. I think what I like about what seems to be going on is there are differing opinions about who's where on the hierarchy and I think that's some of what goes on in the movie.

As you can imagine when you have to summon a force like that together, the opposing elements are pretty freaking gnarly. I would think of those pioneer movies where they've got the cook and the ladies loading the guns and firing at the surrounded wagons. I don't put Coulson in that category, I think he is on the upper tier of people who come to scrap at situations like that but everybody's involved.

Sometimes you can do Shakespeare and you're still not an actor.

I'm not in Captain America because it takes place in the '40s. Both he and Bruce Banner are relationships that evolve during this - two more rock stars that I got to get on stage, ready to play ball.

As a fanboy myself, one of the fun things about the gig has been every time I get a new script, I get to find out more about his day - to-day life and what goes on and what his relationships are.

The hardest thing to get right is to figure out how to bring all those characters together, and to fulfill the promise of The Avengers. They really set a very high bar for themselves because you've been setting this coalition up, for these five movies, and they better deliver. And in my opinion, they thoroughly deliver.

For me, one of the really cool things about this is that throughout these movies, there have been - and I enjoyed it this way - hints at what S.H.I.E.L.D. is and how they function within this Marvel movie universe which, as you know, is deeply based in the comic books.

But what I've also really liked about it is that it not only has Marvel set about... if they just were slavishly trying to bring the comic books to life, literally, I don't the movies would work, because it's different to see something on screen in three dimensions with actors, and they kind of, I believe, are constantly trying to find a way to absolutely respect the source material and at the same time, transform it into something that works and that you believe on screen.

You can never discount the pleasure of showing up to work with Scarlett Johansson and now Cobie Smulders. That's just a day that's easy on your eyes.

What I think is incredible about what Marvel has done and with Jon Favreau I think really maybe helped come up with, is what the template is.

You know I grew up on the Batman movies, and they had some terrific actors in, but you know a lot of the other ones - it wasn't always the case that you had people the caliber of Jeff Bridges or Robert Downey, so to kind of show up and work with Jeremy Renner or Robert or with Mark Ruffalo, any of them, Chris Evans, Chris Hemsworth, the caliber of people you're acting with, to me, is really fun. From the first day I started doing scenes with Robert, it's been one of the funnest experiences I've ever had.

I don't think Aaron Sorkin can write a character who isn't really funny.

I feel like I've had a number of roles in suits, which is hilarious to the people who know me, because it couldn't be further from who I am and what I wear. I think that Aaron Sorkin is, to a certain extent, responsible.

There's very few people, who really thrive creatively under great stress and conflict.

It's a little strange, after all these years of working on camera, but once you start to watch the other people who do this a lot and realize how much of what you're doing has to just come through your voice, I found it really interesting.

What I love about Coulson is that he manages to do that and he manages to wrangle the diva superheroes, and really keep a sense of humor about it. And, you can tell that he really loves his job.

No matter how tight the shot is, if I'm narrating it too much, there's a barrier between you and the experience, because the process of reading a book, or watching a movie, or watching a play is that you're watching a dream.

There's a different set of writers and a different director for the films, but Marvel has turned it into a pretty spectacular job.

When I was backstage at Comic-Con, about to go out and do the panel for Thor, and Joss Whedon ran up and introduced himself, I already almost passed out, right then. And then, he said, "I've been meaning to call you. You have a big part in The Avengers. Can we introduce you as part of the cast?" It was pretty Make-A-Wish Foundation. I was pretty sure I was dying and nobody had told me yet.

The tremendous Jeremy Latcham from Marvel showed up with this one-of-a-kind animated encyclopedia about S.H.I.E.L.D. and The Avengers. Coulson wasn't a part of the comic books, which is a singular thing about him that I thought would get me killed off very quickly, but luckily, it didn't. It just became a thing that I fit into, and they kept finding new and better uses for me.

It was cool to me, as a fan of the comics, to see some of the villains that end up finding them there, and the way that they abuse Coulson before the superheroes come. I'm always, in the movies or in the animated series, getting into trouble that a superhero has to bail me out of.

With the tone of the show, like a lot of the films, the Marvel creative team has found a way to bridge really exciting stuff that has real stakes. They balance some of the action stuff that the fans of the comics really want to see with characters that people can relate to and who are very human.