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What I Do Is Just Go Over And Over And Over My Lines And Learn The Script So Well That I Can Just Be Easy And Relaxed. That's The Way I Always Work.

-Anthony Hopkins

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What I Do Is

Anthony Hopkins

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What I Do Is Just Go Over And Over And Over My Lines And Learn The Script So Well That I Can Just Be Easy And Relaxed. That's The Way I Always Work.

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Try Not To Be Concerned With It. It's A Spiritual Thing. Don't Look For The Results, Don't Live In The Payoff. Live In The Moment Which Is A Spiritual Principle. Live In The Moment And Let The Results Take Care Of Themselves. It's In The Hands Of God. The Rest Is All Ego. And I Have Learned, Over The Years, It's Got Nothing To Do With Me. As My Life Is None Of My Business.

We Have A Boesendorfer Piano That I Play Every Day. It Keeps My Brain And My Fingers Active.

On His Hannibal Lector Mask: I've Got It At Home. I Wear It To Bed Every Night.

We Are Fascinated By The Darkness In Ourselves, We Are Fascinated By The Shadow, We Are Fascinated By The Bogeyman.

I Don't Push My Luck. I Don't Worry About The Results And Therefore Everything Seems To Work Out Well. That's Something I've Learnt Over The Years. The Whole Thing About The Acting Business Is That It's A Hit-or-miss Game So I Keep My Distance From It.

You Look Closely Enough, You'll Find That Everything Has A Weak Spot Where It Can Break, Sooner Or Later.

I Love Life Because What More Is There?

As A Welshman That Can't Sing, I Never Feel More Proud To Be Welsh Than When I Hear The Treorchy Male Choir - The Master Choir Of Them All. If I Could Sing I Would Apply For Membership Myself.

I'm Devious, Cruel, Cunning And Addictive.

I’m Not Young Anymore. I Don’t Wanna Start Over Again.

I Always Had A Knack For Improvisation. I Can Write Down The Notes I Play, But Never Really Had A Proper Academic Musical Background. I Suppose I'm Blessed And Cursed By The Fact I Have That Freedom.

I Drank A Lot, But I Wouldn't Have Missed It. I Look Back On It As Sort Of Dreary Enjoyment, Because I Don't Have To Be There Anymore.

For Me, Time Is The Greatest Mystery Of All. The Fact Is That We're Dreaming All The Time. That's What Really Gets Me. We Have A Fathomless Lake Of Unconsciousness Just Beneath Our Skulls.

I Said Once That If They Gave Me Enough Money To Read The Phone Book, I'd Do It. I Live In A Total State Of Non-expectation. I Don't Expect Things, And I Keep My Expectations Very Low About Everything.

We All Dream. We Dream Vividly, Depending On Our Nature. Our Existence Is Beyond Our Explanation, Whether We Believe In God Or We Have Religion Or We're Atheist.

A Census Taker Once Tried To Test Me. I Ate His Liver With Some Fava Beans And A Nice Chianti.

I Was Hell Bent On Destruction... It Was Like Being Possessed By A Demon.

I Know That Some Actors And Directors Like To Have Intensity On Set. I Don't, Particularly. Certainly, If They Want That, That's Fine, But I Can't Work Like That.

At My Age, Any Day Above Ground And Vertical Is A Good Day.

I Was Called 'dumbo,' Like The Elephant, As A Child Because I Couldn't Understand Things At School.

Things Have Changed So Much Now. Everything Is Downloaded Onto Computers. I'm Not A Computer-savvy Guy, But With Downloading The Movie Industry Has Changed.

You Relax Within The Verse. You Realize The Structure Of The Verse And Relax Into It. It's Like Swimming. Or Riding A Bike. You Can't Make It Sound Real If You Are Thinking It Through As You Go. You Can't Think Through Shakespeare, You Have To Speak It. And Listen To The Rhythm Of It And Then It Takes You Over. And To Make It Sound Real You Speak As If You Believe It. Don't Act It. Just Be It.

I Don't Have Any Expectations About My Films. If They're Good, They're Good - If They're Not, They're Not. About 10 Years Ago, I Remember Going To See One Of My Movies - I Can't Even Remember Which One Now - And Everyone Was Jumping Up And Down, Getting Excited, Saying What A Great Film It Was Going To Be. We All Went In And Watched It, And It Was The Slowest Movie I've Ever Seen. The Next Day, The Reviews Were Terrible And Half The Studio Was Fired.

I Look In The Mirror And I See The Lines, But I Don't Care. It's A Good Time. I Don't Know Why It's Such A Good Time, But It's A Good Time.

Most Of My Last 30 Years Have Been Like That. Results And Manifestations Of Things I'd Dreamed Of As A Young Kid And Wanted As A Child And As A Young Man. I Realized It Maybe 30 Years Ago. I Thought, "this Is Unreal. This Has Happened As I Expected It To, As I'd Pictured It." My Whole Life Has Been Like That And I'm Fascinated By That Power That We All Have. That We Create Our Lives As We Go.

It Created In Me A Yearning For All That Is Wide And Open And Expansive. Something That Will Never Allow Me To Fit In In My Own Country, With Its Narrow Towns And Narrow Roads And Narrow Kindnesses And Narrow Reprimands.

I Think Doubt Is A Very Healthy Way To Live.

You Have To Have Humor. If You Don't Have Humor And You Take Yourself Seriously, You're Dead In The Water. You Have To Be Jostled. I Love It. You've Gotta Have A Laugh. It's Better Than Working For A Living.

Working For A Living

I Wouldn't Use The Word 'scared' For My Role As Hitchcock, But It Was My Most Insecure. Taking On Such A Formidable, Giant Personality Such As Hitchcock; He Was One Of The Great Geniuses Of World Cinema. Sheer Genius.

Hitchcock Was Such A Master Of Putting On Screen Things That Made You Uneasy. Somebody Once Asked Him What Frightened Him Most, And He Said The Police. He Came From A Poor Background. I Think He Understood Those Fears.

I've Been Composing Music All My Life And If I'd Been Clever Enough At School I Would Like To Have Gone To Music College.

We're Just Blades Of Grass, And When We Go, We Go, We Never Come Back; One Life . . . Maybe That's True. But I Tend To Believe That This Is Not All There Is. Because My Life Has Been Like A Shadow Of Something Deeper. And I've Experienced That Many Times.

Blades Of Grass

I Became An Actor Because I Didn't Know What Else To Do. Academically, I Wasn't Good.

I Was Born In The Same Town As Richard Burton, The Actor, And I Saw Him, He Used To Come - He And His Wife Drove By In The Car In My Father's Shop And Burton Would Come Home From Hollywood And Ask Him For His Autograph, And I Thought, I Want To Be Like Him. And That's All I Said To Myself, I Want To Be Like That. I Want To Get Out Of This Environment Of My Own Empty Mind.

Shakespeare's So Bloody Difficult, And I Don't Like Failure. You Can Fail On Film, But There's Nobody Actually There In The Flesh To Watch You Failing.

I Love To Have A Laugh. I Like To Tease People.

Sometimes I Feel Tired And Think I Ought To Give It Up, I Don't Want To Just Retire. No, I Enjoy It All And You Just Keep Going Until The Day Comes When You Can't Do It Anymore. And That's What I Want To Do.

It's Very Difficult To Liberate Yourself From What You've Learned. You Know It's Almost Impossible Because You Learn In Order To Survive.

I Love The Hour In Makeup. It Gives You Time To Think And Have A Cup Of Coffee. It's My Favorite Part Of The Day.

Oh, The Truth, Oh Yeah, Lot Of Trouble That Got Us Into, Didn't It, Over The Last Maybe Thousand Years? Hitler Knew The Truth, So Did Stalin, So Did Mao Zedong, So Did The Inquisition. They All Knew The Truth And That Caused Such Horror. Certainty Is The Enemy.

I Have No Interest In Shakespeare And All That British Nonsense... I Just Wanted To Get Famous And All The Rest Is Hogwash.

I Was Bullied As A Boy - Lots Of Kids Are, But Hopefully Most Of Us Get On With Our Lives And Grow Up.

I Found A Way Into The Acting Business Because I Thought, Well, It Beats Working For A Living, And So That's What I Do. But I Still Feel Like A Bit Of A Stranger In It All. I've Never Really Belonged Anywhere.

I Think One Of The Things You Have To Have Is A Respect For The Camera, A Real Respect, And A Real Love For It, And To Really, When I Say Take It Seriously, Quote 'seriously', I Mean Not Patronize It. It's A Big Mistake To Patronize It And Think It's A Third Rate Medium, Because It's Not, It's A Great Art Form.

I Couldn't Say I Ever Dreamt Of Becoming A Composer, A Pianist, Or Anything Else For That Matter. I Have The Kind Of Brain Where Nothing Is Set In Stone.

I Think Julianne Moore Is Very, Very Good. I've Worked With Her. We Did Surviving Picasso. I Remember One Scene We Did Together. She Had To Have A Nervous, A Mental, Breakdown In This One Scene. I Didn't Have Many Lines. I Just Had To Make Sure I Knew I Came In On Cue All Right. And I Was Just Watching Her Walking Though The Rehearsal. I Thought I Know What She's Doing, "this Is Going To Be Terrific." So They Said, "are You Ready" And She Said, "yeah," "ok, Roll The Camera." And All In One Take.

When You're Younger You Have So Many Ideas About Yourself; Everything Is Important. It's Not When You Look Back, Nothing Is That Important. It's Only Life.

No Expectations. Ask Nothing, Expect Nothing And Accept Everything, And Life Is Very Well.

When People Call Me Sir Anthony I Just Think Oh, That's A Bit Odd. But I'm Not Cynical About It. Um, I Just Feel More Comfortable Being Called Tony Or Mr. Hopkins, Whatever Name I'm Called.

Whether It's Overeating Or It's Overworking Or Over-sex Or Whatever It Is, Alcoholism, Drug Addition, We Push Ourselves To The Brink And Then Pull Back Because It's Kind Of Exciting.

I Have No Education, I Have No Academic Background In Painting Or In Music, But I Write Music And I Compose Music And I Write And I Sell Paintings, And My Rule Is, Well, They Can't Arrest Me.

People Ask Me How Did You Choose The Part And How Did You Prepare For This Work? I Just Learned The Lines And Showed Up; I Don't Know What Else To Say Because That's All I Know How To Do.

I Worked At The Steel Company Of Wales When I Was 17. My Job Was To Supply Tools To The Guys Working The Blast Furnaces.

When You're Younger You Have A Lot Of Ideas And You're Probably More Insecure, All Those Things. I Work With Young Actors Now And I See Their Insecurities And I Make Fun Of Them. I Don't Make Fun Of Them But I Make Them Laugh, Because I Know What They're Going Through. When You Get Older You Think 'it's Only A Movie After All, It's Not Brain Surgery.'

I've Played A Lot Of Parts. But I Don't Look At My Feeling Is That This Is A Job. It's Given Me A Good Living.

I Wanted To Be A Musician. I Just Wanted To Be Famous Because I Wanted To Escape From What I Felt Was My Limitation In Life... And I Wanted To Write Music, And I Didn’t Know What I Was Doing And I Never Had The Technique Or Understanding Of It... But I’ve Always Played The Piano And I Can Improvise On The Piano, But The Problem Is That I Can’t Write Down What I Write. I Can Read Music But I Can’t Write Numbers.

I Learn Poetry, Learn Text, And That Really Keeps You Alive.

I Don't Know What Acting Is, But I Enjoy It.

My Philosophy Is: It's None Of My Business What People Say Of Me And Think Of Me.

Living With Reality Is A Very Good Trick, It Gives You Tremendous Freedom And It Changes The Structure Of The Molecules Of Your Soul By Living With Reality Because You Don't Expect Anything Anymore. Which Is A Weird Paradox.

Relish Everything That's Inside Of You, The Imperfections, The Darkness, The Richness And Light And Everything. And That Makes For A Full Life.

Richness Of Life

I Don't Want To Be Anything Else Other Than What I Am. I Can Say That With Passion. No Regrets.

I'm Not Unfamiliar With Music, And I Really Do Write Music. I've Gotten A Talent For It. I Don't Have The Technical Skills, But I Do Plan To Learn.

I Like The Good Life Too Much, I'm Not Good At Going On Stage Night After Night And On Wet Wednesday Afternoons.

You're Not More Than One Generation From Poor White Trash, Are You, Agent Starling?

I Think The First British Actor Who Really Worked Well In Cinema Was Albert Finney. He Was A Back-street Marlon Brando. He Brought A Great Wittiness And Power To The Screen. The Best Actor We've Had.

I'm More And More Convinced That Life Is A Dream. What Has Happened To Me Is Surely A Dream.

Acting Is Just A Process Of Relaxation, Actually. Knowing The Text So Well And Trusting That The Instinct And The Subconscious Mind, Whatever You Want To Call It, Is Going To Take Over.

Israel Means War And Destruction And We Americans Are Behind This War And I Am Ashamed Of Being American.

I Am Not Very Good With Relationships. With Anyone. I Can't Be Locked Up With Anyone For Too Long.

When You Are At The Right Age To Play Hamlet You Are Still To Young And Immature To Play It. It Is Much Later, When You Get The Life Experience And The Emotional Power, That You Understand Hamlet Or Macbeth.

I Was Lousy In School. Real Screwed-up. A Moron. I Was Antisocial And Didn't Bother With The Other Kids. A Really Bad Student. I Didn't Have Any Brains. I Didn't Know What I Was Doing There. That's Why I Became An Actor.

I Thought I Did Play One Villain, Hitler, [who Is] Like Lecter In Some Ways, But He's A Mythical Figure, Anyway.

I Think The Healthy Way To Live Is To Make Friends With The Beast Inside Oneself, And That Means Not The Beast But The Shadow. The Dark Side Of One's Nature. Have Fun With It And You Know, Is To Accept Everything About Ourselves.

I Hate Taxing My Mind With Analysis. I'm Not A Good Analyst. I Cannot Talk About Acting. I Hate Talking About It. I Hate Talking About Analyzing.

I Love Traveling. I Like To Keep Moving. I Love The Big Open Spaces In America.

I Wanted Revenge; I Wanted To Dance On The Graves Of A Few People Who Made Me Unhappy. It's A Pretty Infantile Way To Go Through Life - I'll Show Them - But I've Done It, And I've Got More Than I Ever Dreamed Of.

I Don't Have A Vast Longing For The Stage.

Actors I Admire? Ed Harris, Or Course, I Think He's Terrific; Because I Know He Always Had To Fight Being What He Looked Like A Lot, But I Think He's A Terrific Actor.

I Enjoy Painting. I Don't Know If I'm Good At It, But I Paint. I Paint Very Quickly.

If You're In A Successful Play And The Play Is Working Well - I Mean Successful Because The Audiences Like It, The Audiences Respond Well - It's A Pleasure.

I'll Do Anything To Keep Everyone Laughing. Things Get Too Intense On Film Sets. I Remember On The Elephant Man, I Used To Imitate A Cat Without Moving My Lips. David Lynch Would Say, "cut! Sorry, We've Got A Noise Somewhere On Set." Everyone Would Be Looking Around For This Cat.

The Movie Industry Is Full Of Crazy People Who Think That They Are God.

If You Do Things, Whether It's Acting Or Music Or Painting, Do It Without Fear - That's My Philosophy. Because Nobody Can Arrest You And Put You In Jail If You Paint Badly, So There's Nothing To Lose.

I’m Not Being Cynical, But When You’re Doing A Movie You Have A Number Of Choices As An Actor. Then You See It All Cut Together And All Of Those Precious Little Pieces You Put In Are Maybe On The Cutting Room Floor. So, You Don’t Have That Much Control. You Have Very Little Control, In Fact.

Acting Is About Listening And Reacting. John Wayne Was Right: Acting Is Just Reacting. You Don't Have To Do Much - As Long As You Stay Out Of The Way Of Others. That's Why It Works.

I'm Always Cast In These Strange Men... That's Not Me, Really.

What A Glorious Night. Every Face I See Is A Memory. It May Not Be A Perfectly Perfect Memory. Sometimes We Had Our Ups And Downs. But We're All Together And You're Mine For A Night. And I'm Going To Break Precedent And Tell You My One-candle Wish...that You Would Have A Life As Lucky As Mine, Where You Can Wake Up One Morning And Say, 'i Don't Want Anything More'. Sixty-five Years. Don't They Go By In A Blink?

My Life Has Been A Kind Of Mystery To Me. By All My Logical, Linear Thinking I Started Out In School As A Little Boy, I Didn't Have A Clue About Anything. What They Were Talking About In School, Couldn't Play Sports, Couldn't Learn, And I Was Bottom Of The Class.

Keep Low Expectations And Life Gets Pretty Good.

Low Expectations

The Art Of Acting Is Not To Act. Once You Show Them More, What You Show Them, In Fact Is Bad Acting.

People Ask, 'should I Call You Sir Hopkins?' But I Say, 'no. Call Me Tony,' Because It's Too Much Of A Lift-up.

A Conductor Can't Be Too Arrogant With An Orchestra And Try To Impose Himself Too Much.

If You Don't Follow Through On Your Dreams, You Might As Well Be A Vegetable.

I Never Make Conscious Decisions.

I've Got No Need To Prove To Myself That I Can Do Shakespeare. I've Done It.

Richard Burton Came From The Same Town As Me, So I Thought I'd Follow My Nose, And Follow My Luck. I Think I've Been Very Lucky.

I Like To Work. I Don't Like To Disrupt My Equilibrium. I Don't Like To Change My Head. I'd Rather Be A Third-rate Actor. It's A Job, And I'm Dedicated In My Way. I Enjoy It. I'm Serious About It. But If It Doesn't Come Off, I'm Not Going To Die.

I Love Roller Coasters. I Don't Get A Chance Often, But I've Gone To Magic Mountain And Gone On The Rides. I Love Roller Coasters.

I Come From - I Came From Wales, And It's A Strong, Butch Society. We Were In The War And All That. People Didn't Waste Time Feeling Sorry For Themselves. You Had To Get On With It. So My Credo Is Get On With It. I Don't Waste Time Being Soft. I'm Not Cold, But I Don't Like Being, Wasting My Time With - Life's Too Short.

It Was A Challenge, To Work With Oliver Stone.

I'm Not A Health Freak. I Just Work Out Every Day.

The Knighthood Was A Tremendous Honour, I Don't Dismiss It. But I Feel Embarrassed By The Flowery, Theatrical Stuff That Goes With Being An Actor.

My Weak Spot Is Laziness. I Have A Lot Of Weak Spots - Cookies, Croissants; My Wife Is Always Lecturing Me About This, I Tend To Put It All Down As Habit Or It's Just Acting.

The Trick Is Not To Get Too Fanatical About Getting The Accent Too Accurate Because Then That Becomes A Mask. What I Try To Do Is Just Painting And Sketching Some Of The Sounds Without Obliterating My Own Voice.

I Don't Believe In Nepotism. I Don't Much Like The Idea Of Parents Who Interfere.

You Have To Be Pretty Tough To Be An Actor, And You Have To Be Pretty Certain What You Want. You Can't Waffle Through This Business.

I Just Learn My Lines, Go On Set. Do My Preparation, Whatever That Is. Have A Cup Of Coffee. Say Hello To Everyone. And Be Friendly. "action" - And Then Do It.

We Are Dying From Overthinking. We Are Slowly Killing Ourselves By Thinking About Everything. Think. Think. Think. You Can Never Trust The Human Mind Anyway. It's A Death Trap.

I Don't Like Mushiness. I'm A Very Emotional Person But I Hate Sentimentality. I Don't Like Great Demonstrations Of Emotion. But As I'm Getting Older, I'm Getting Much More Open About All That.

I'm Having A Great Life. And I'm 73 And They Still Phone Me Up And Ask Me To Do A Job Here And There.

My Weak Spot Is That I Don't Like Analyzing So I Tend To Be A Bit Lazy; I Tend To Get Bored Quickly, Which Means I Must Be Boring.

I Have A Punishing Workout Regimen. Every Day I Do 3 Minutes On A Treadmill, Then I Lie Down, Drink A Glass Of Vodka And Smoke A Cigarette.

I Am Able To Play Monsters Well. I Understand Monsters. I Understand Madmen.

That's What Happens If You Don't Address The Darkness In You. You Become Repressed And Depressed And Suicidal.

People Forget That Mozart Wrote For Commissions. There's A Thing In Psychology Where They Think If It's Popular, It Can't Be Serious.

I Can't Stand Directors Who Try To Micro-manage Everything. When It Happens These Days I Just Walk Off Set, Saying If They Don't Like The Way I'm Doing It They Can Get Someone Else.

My Life Turned Out To Be Beyond My Greatest Dreams.

I Do The Best I Can - I Know My Way Around [russian Method Acting Pioneer] Stanislavski, But I Can't Take Myself Seriously Like That. I Respect People Who Do It, Of Course. I Just Think I'm Lucky To Still Be Working At 73. You Reach A Point In Life Where You Just Think, "show Up, Do Your Job, Make Sure The Cheque's On The Way," And That's It. I'm Not Hungry To Do Anything More, Really.

Once You Accept The Fact That There's Nothing To Fear, You Drill Into The Primal Oil Well. I Believe When We Do Things Without Fear, We Can Do Anything. As Long As You Don't Worry About The Consequences.

Guilt Is The Thief Of Life.

Getting Old Ain't For The Faint Of Heart.

The Magical, Supernatural Force That Is With Us Every Second Is Time. We Can't Even Comprehend It. It's Such An Illusion, It's Such A Strange Thing.

Supernatural Forces

I'm Fascinated By The Fact That We Can't Grasp Anything About Time.

I Always Liked To Take The Plunge, You Know, I'd Jump In At The Deep End And Hope That I'd Find Land Somehow, Or Hope I'd Float Or Survive. That's More Or Less The Way I've Gone Through My Life.

I Don't Have Many Friends; I'm Very Much A Loner. As A Child I Was Very Isolated And I've Never Been Really Close To Anyone.

If You Have High Expectations You're Going To Get Resentments And All Kinds Of Tension.

Women Never Really Care To Face The Truth When Their Hearts Are Involved.

I Spent Two Years In The Military Service, Then I Trudged Around In Repertory For Quite A While. I Somehow Wound Up At The National Theatre, Though, And Then I Was Definitely On My Way.

Jonathan Demme Is A Very Sharp Editor Of His Movies.

I Was Trundling Around With My Inadequacies, And Inner Pain And Loneliness. I Yearned, Desperately, To Be Something. I Yearned To Get Out From Where I Was ... Some Deep Discontent Within Myself, Actually Some Deep Dislike Of Myself.

When I Was A Younger Actor, I Was Very Immersed In It, Very "method" And All That. Now, I Don't Give A Hoot.

When You Begin To Believe You Have License Because You Are A Special Person Breathing Special Oxygen, That's When You're In Big Trouble. That's The Road To Insanity. And A Lot Of People In The Studios Are Like That. They Believe That They Are Special. I Do Think Actors Are Blessed, Or Cursed, With Maybe A Slightly Heightened Awareness, Which You Have To Use.

If You Don't Go When You Want To Go, When You Do Go, You'll Find You've Gone.

Acting Is Constricted Because You Have The Lines. But I Improvise With It And What I Learn On The Set. I Improvise Rhythms And Just Changes.

I Used To Be A Bit Obsessed By Acting But Not Anymore. I Do Enjoy Acting But I Probably Enjoy It More Now Because It's Easier. I Can't Work In The Theater Because To Me It's Too Serious. It's Like Being In Prison For Me. I Admire People That Can Do That But I Can't Do It. I'd Rather Live My Life And Do A Bit Of Acting In Between.

There Are People Who Are Convinced Supernatural Forces Are At Work, But I've No Idea. I Suspect 'possession' Might Be A Psychological Thing, Like Schizophrenia. We All Think We Know Things, But We Don't Know A Damn Thing. Whether God Exists, Why We're Here... Nobody Really Knows Any Of It.

Supernatural Forces

By Giving Up 'the Need' And 'the Want', Things Begin To Happen For You

Non-expectation And Acceptance. Because Expectation Leads To Resentment And Depression, So I Have No Expectations.

How Do You Play Hannibal Lector? Well Just Don't Move. Scare People By Being Still.

I Love To Read, And So I've Been Reading Everything I Can, Not Intensely, But I Love To Read So I Read "origin Of Species" By Darwin And I Can't Make Head Or Tail Of E=mc Squared By Einstein, But I Try To Baffle My Way Through That.

It's Such A Pleasant Surprise When You Come On Set And You Find Someone In Charge Like Ken Branagh Or James Ivory. You Know That You're Going To Do A Day's Work And At The End Of It, It's Going To Be Good.

Pleasant Surprises

My Weak Spot Is Laziness. Oh, I Have A Lot Of Weak Spots: Cookies, Croissants.

My Father Wasn't A Cruel Man. And I Loved Him. But He Was A Pretty Tough Character. His Own Father Was Even Tougher - One Of Those Victorians, Hard As Iron - But My Dad Was Tough Enough.

The Way To Make Better Decisions Is To Make More Of Them. Then Make Sure You Learn From Each One, Including Those That Don't Seem To Work Out In The Short Term: They Will Provide Valuable Distinctions To Make Better Evaluations And Therefore Decisions In The Future. Realize That Decision Making, Like Any Skill You Focus On Improving, Gets Better The More Often You Do It.

Years Ago I Met Richard Burton In Port Talbot, My Home Town, And Afterwards He Passed In His Car With His Wife, And I Thought, 'i Want To Get Out And Become Like Him'. Not Because Of Wales, Because I Love Wales, But Because I Was So Limited As A Child At School And So Bereft And Lonely, And I Thought Becoming An Actor Would Do That.

The Whole Point Of Courage, To Overcome Your Fear. That's The Interesting Thing, When Courage Bleeds Through The Fear.

Interesting Things

I Just Wanted To Be A Composer; I Became An Actor By Default, Really. I Got A Scholarship To A College Of Music And Drama, Hoping To Take A Scholarship In Music. But I Ended Up As An Acting Student, So I've Stuck With That For The Last 50-odd Years.

In The Theatre, People Talk. Talk, Talk Until The Cows Come Home About Journeys Of Discovery And About What Hazlitt Thought Of A Line Of Shakespeare. I Can't Stand It.

Acting Is A Creative Process, And Directing And Music. I Think Creative People - And I Take Myself As A Creative Person And It Doesn't Mean You Have To Be An Actor, A Musician, Or A Painter - But I Think If You Are In A Creative Profession Or A Creative Business You Do Have A Heightened Awareness.

I Never Cling On To Hope Or Certainty. They're The Enemies Of Peace.

I Don't Have People Following Me Around, Like Bodyguards. I Don't Know How People Live Like That. Maybe The Young Movie Stars Have To Live Like That, I Don't Know. But It Seems A Little Crazy To Me. I Don't Think You Need All That Stuff.

I Tried Acting, Liked It, And Stuck With It. I Saw It As The Way I Would Keep That Promise To Myself Of Getting Back At Those Who Had Made My School Life A Misery.

I Play Music - I Write My Own Music, But I Play Music, Just Background Music Really, And Just Let It Happen.

What I Do Is Just Go Over And Over And Over My Lines And Learn The Script So Well That I Can Just Be Easy And Relaxed. That's The Way I Always Work.

I'm One Of The Slowest Drivers On The Road. I Mosey Along. If You're Doing Anything Too Fast, Including Living Life Too Fast, That Creates Sudden Death. If I Have To Be Somewhere On Time, I Make Sure I Leave Early Enough.

I've Got A Great Sense Of Humor.

I'd Like To Wake Up And Look Like Brad Pitt In The Morning, But I Don't. I Look In The Mirror, And I See Me.

Oh Yes. I'm An Actor, So I Just Learn My Lines, And Show Up And Do It. I Gave It A Little Bit Of Thought.

Some Nights You Might Go Through An Entire Performance And Not Feel A Thing, And The Audience May Have A Much Better Time, 'cause If You're Enjoying Yourself On Stage Too Much, They're Having A Terrible Time Because They Can't Hear You. And If You're A Woman Your Mascara's Running.

I Am A Bit Of A Solitude Person - A Solitary Personality. I Like Being On My Own. I Don't Have Any Major Friendships Or Relationships With People.

I Remember Coming To New York, In 1974 To Do A Play Here Called Equis. And I Remember The First Morning Getting Up And Walking Around The Streets And I Thought, "i'm Home." I Felt Really At Peace Here.

Certainty Is The Enemy Of Mankind. If You're Certain About Everything, You Have The Inquisition, You Have Nazis And You Have - That Certainty Is Something To Be Guarded About.

I've Always Liked American Actors Particularly. Because That Was My First Impression. I Was Very Enamoured Of America When I Was A Kid Because We Were Surrounded By American Soldiers During The War, The Accent Was Very Strange To Me, It Was Very Exotic And Very Captivating.

The Reward Is In The Doing Of It.

We're All Different. Some People Are Musicians, Some People Are Actors, Some People Are Agents And Some People Are Accountants... We're All Different.

Ryan Gosling. He Was A Good Kid, Good Actor. I Like Him Very Much. What Was The Name Of The Movie? I've Forgotten It. Fracture.

Working With Katherine Hepburn, She Said To Me, "don't Act." She Said, "read The Lines. Just Be. Just Speak The Lines." I Said, "okay." She Said, "you Look Good. You Got A Good Pair Of Shoulders, You Got A Good Head, Good Face."

I Watched A Film With A Very Famous, Great, Great Actor, I Won't Mention His Name Because Everyone Loves His Memory, But I Thought, "god He Was Acting A Lot." Great Actor, But Nonstop Acting. Wall To Wall, Fitted-carpet Acting.

If I Spent All My Time Criticising Myself, I Wouldn't Be Able To Function. There Are Actors Who Theorise Till The Cows Come Home. I Haven't The Patience For Them. It's Maybe Shallow, But That's Why I'll Never Be Part Of The Acting Set.

I Am Young! Being Creative And Keeping Your Brain Occupied Is Very Sensible Because If You Don't You Die, Slowly.

There's Many A Good Tune Played By An Old Banjo.

I'm Very Much A Loner. I Don't Like Long Relationships With People And I Always Keep People At A Distance.

Why Love, If Losing Hurts So Much? I Have No Answers Anymore: Only The Life I Have Lived... The Pain Now Is Part Of The Happiness Then.

I've Been Very Lucky. I've Had My Problems In The Past, I've Had My Troubles, But You Move On. I Had A Great Life And I Am Really Thankful For It.

Life's Too Short To Deal With Other People's Insecurities.

When You're Young, You're Very Insecure. And If I Could Learn, If I Could Revisit My Own Past I Could Say To Myself, Don't Think Too Much, Just Get On And Do It.

I Think All Those Actors From That Generation, Like Bogart - They Were Wonderful Actors. They Didn't Act. They Just Came On And They Did It, And The Characters Were Wonderful.

I Don't Mind Being A Commodity. It's Given Me A Good Life.

I Just Remember Kathy Bates Getting On The Stage And "the Oscar Goes To Anthony Hopkins." I Looked Around, Because I Really Thought Nick Nolte Would Get It. I Really Thought Nick Would Get It. I Was Very Surprised. It Was Neck And Neck With Nick Nolte And Myself. So I Really Was Expecting That To Happen, And I Went In There Without Any Expectations.

When I Direct I Try To Keep It A Unique Design Of My Own. Naturally You're Influenced.

I've Reached A Happy Stage In My Life - You Can Call It "happy" - But I Have No Expectations Anymore. I'm Glad I'm Not Young Anymore.

There's No Truth In Acting, It's All A Trick, Because You Go On Stage In Front Of Sets, You're On Film - It's All A Trick. I'm Making It Sound Very - I Really Am Demystifying It, But What I Try To Do, What I Do, And I Hope Effectively, Is To Create A Reality As If It Is Happening Now, That You're Fishing For Words Out Of The Air.

Acting's Entertainment. It's Not Brain Surgery.

I Play Piano And That's My Love. I Read And I Paint And I Compose Music, So I've Got A Pretty Full Creative Life. And It's Not Because, I'm Obsessively Creative.

My Father Was Grounded, A Very Meat-and-potatoes Man. He Was A Baker.

Well, Everyone Likes Movies When They're A Little Kid.

When I Was A Young Guy, I Knew Everything. Now I Know Very Little. I Know Less And Less As The Time Goes On.

Beware The Tyranny Of The Weak. They Just Suck You Dry.

My Life Is Not My Own Business.

Interdependence

Oliver Stone Is A Great Director And I've Seen Many Films Over The Years, But I Try To Create Stuff Out Of My Own Imagination. I Want To Break All The Rules And Mess About With It And Make A Different Movie Just For The Fun Of It.

I've Always Liked To Be A Meat And Potatoes Kind Of Actor Who Doesn't Believe In Any Of The Highfalutin Stuff About Acting, So I Tend To Be A Little Bit More Cynical.

I Came Here In 1974 To Do A Play, And Then I Went To L.a. I Really Like Living In America. I Feel More At Home Here Than Anywhere Else.

Every Time I Try To Retire, Or Even Think Of Retiring From Acting, My Agent Comes Up With A Script.

I Don't Know Why They Gave Me A Knighthood - Though It's Very Nice Of Them - But I Only Ever Use The Title In The U.s. The Americans Insist On It And Get Offended If I Don't.

I'm Most Suspicious Of Scripts That Have A Lot Of Stage Direction At The Top Of The Page Sunrise Over The Desert And Masses Of A Whole Essay Before You Get To The Dialogue.

I've Had No contact With My Daughter For Years. That's Her Choice. Anyway, You Move On. If People Don't Want To Bother With Me, Fine. You Know, God Bless Them, And Move On.

I Worked With Steven Spielberg On Amistad... He Seemed So Very Secure In Himself That He Let Me Do Things.

Multiply It By Infinity And Take It To The Depths Of Forever, And You Will Still Have Barely A Glimpse Of What I'm Talking About.

You Still Wake Up Sometimes. You Wake Up In The Dark And Hear The Screaming Of The Lambs.

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Bernard Berenson

Gerard Manley Hopkins

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