Fifteen years before I became a screen actor, I was in the theatre. A lot of my work was comedy, which I loved doing. It’s harder.
BEN KINGSLEYI think that various styles and methods and approaches are an invention of people who don’t understand the process of acting and who try very hard to label things.
More Ben Kingsley Quotes
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The many many imponderables come together when a film opens and for all sorts of reasons it may or may not succeed.
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I didn’t go to drama school because, from the first refusal I then, as I said, a couple of weeks later, was offered a professional job, where I am immensely grateful to the journey.
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The number of choices you make in the event that you see on stage, those choices are sometimes largely determined by the rehearsal process and the experiments that you go through and the choices that you make in the rehearsal room, not in front of an audience.
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Equal partners aren’t always what we envision as being manifestly equal. Equality can come in many different shapes and sizes and combinations.
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You cannot learn a lesson of profound forgiveness unless you understand what it is to be wounded and forgive that which has wounded you.
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I think Romeo and Juliet is uplifting. That’s how much a son wishes to avenge his father. That is how much two young people can love each other.
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I do believe female directors, as well as our female writer, can bring out male vulnerability that some men can’t because they can’t face it.
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If I were to play somebody who ran a fish and chip shop, I would not work in a fish and chip shop for three months. Staring at chips is not going to help me in my performance.
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The camera does not like acting. The camera is only interested in filming behaviour. So you damn well learn your lines until you know them inside out, while standing on your head!
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I think I’m more bonded, emotionally and in a craft sense, to films that tell extraordinary stories about extraordinary destinies.
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The trick is to try and justify every word on the page and make sure my character is the man who would say that.
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That hunger of the flesh, that longing for ease, that terror of incarceration, that insistence on tribal honour being obeyed: all of that exists, and it exists everywhere.
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I have never felt bereft of anything.
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I was fortunate as a young actor, to go straight to the RSC, where I learned that being an actor can bring with it wonderful responsibilities.
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As an actor there’s no autonomy, unless you’re prepared to risk the possibility of starving.
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Well, it’s wonderful to be identified strongly with my work.
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The hierarchy of class in London was rigid. It was like a religion. It still is to a certain extent.
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When I choose a role it’s either because I recognise the man, or that I’m very curious to know him. If I neither recognise nor know him, then it is better that I don’t play him.
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I would like to make it known, on this program, loud and clear, that I would absolutely embrace with all five of my arms being a Bond villain.
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If it’s a really well written villain, he probably has more layers than the archetypal good person. So that would be very attractive to an actor. No one chooses to be a villain; it’s usually a reaction to something else.
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I’m convinced that had I not changed my name, I don’t think I would have had quite the same career curve that I eventually had.
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I have a rather naive approach, I think, to my job.
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I think that you can fall into bad habits with comedy… It’s a tightrope to stay true to the character, true to the irony, and allow the irony to happen.
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Millions of children are disempowered and we need to empower them.
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In England, it’s now Sir Ben. Mister has just disappeared. It’s not even on my passport anymore. They’ve taken Mister away from me.
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One of the greatest things drama can do, at it’s best, is to redefine the words we use every day such as love, home, family, loyalty and envy. Tragedy need not be a downer.
BEN KINGSLEY