A character I would love to play is Iago, from Othello.
Everyone is an abused child, if you think about what governments do.
I can't do anything else. So if this falls through, I'm screwed.
There is less pressure as a character actor. It generally means that you will be acting for all of your life, which is my intention. It is not my intention to just be a rich and famous person, that would be pretty boring.
The better the writing, the easier it gets.
If you meet somebody who's spent any length of time in prison, you don't let your guard down. Ever. And really, that's what that was about-if you open up too much, you're asking to get your teeth kicked in.
I will watch everything that Cary Grant did, or Kubrick made or Bergman.
I miss my family, and I like being a tourist when I go back.
I'm sick of very white teeth and lots of gymnasium practice. I'm bored, you know, send in the next one. I wanted a real man that I could believe was my brother, my father, you know, my next-door neighbor - a real person.
Certainly coming to America has been extraordinary.
I like the idea of experimenting with different kinds of formats, and I think you've got to keep on your toes and keep changing.
The only thing I won't do is theater.
A good part of why I never went back to England was part of that, I didn't want to be in those sort of flowery films. But I think it's a nice change of pace-I don't know how long it'll go for. There will always be the Merchant-Ivory/Kenneth Branagh movies, but there's something else now-really, it's always been there but the Americans getting to see it makes all the difference.
I have a bad time between jobs because I'm always convinced I'll never work again. I think it may be an English thing, this fear of unemployment.
Well, I think first it was rare for me to do anything that had any kind of a romantic note to it.
You read a script and its based on 'Reservoir Dogs' and 'Pulp Fiction', and it goes right in the bin.
Television has changed. The very nature of it is not even television anymore.
When something arrives, you have no idea what's in it, which is good. And then, it's is the story leaps off the page at you and how your character functions within it. There could be just one scene and if it's wonderful, it doesn't matter how much you're working on it because you just want to be in it. It's really about what your character's day to day world looks like, and if you feel like that's something that's complete, and that you'd like to inhabit for awhile. You'll know by a couple of scenes in. If the character grabs you, you run with it.
I'm so scared of doing theater. I've got stage fright, although they keep asking me to come back.
I have come close to producing films. But generally by the time they hit the screen, there's about 50 people with producer credits, so what's the point. I usually find scripts I like with no money attached and take them to producers that I know and try to raise finance.
How would you compare Polanski or Kubrick? I try not to do any comparisons.
I don't care to analyze acting. On the other hand there is a fascination because distributors are putting out British films. You get films here with great performances you'll never see again. Why compare. We should go after the businessmen.
Ilike ideas writers have that I might not have written. Writers are there for a reason... to write for me.
There just seems to be more acceptance now of other kinds of British films, than the picture-postcard ones.
I'd seen musicians act, and it scares me. And they make more money than me.
