The job is the same – to attempt to make it sound like you’ve never said it before and as if it’s just occurred to you. And that’s the same whether you’re on camera or whether you’re on stage in a room full of people.
One of my great regrets, and I don’t have many, is that I spent too long putting people’s status and reputation ahead of their more important qualities.
All actors who have been around for a long time, which I have, and have been skint for long periods, which I have, find it difficult to turn down jobs. If I turn anything down my stomach turns over. I feel sick. It feels like gambling.
So there are things like projection and filling the room, and not dropping the ends of lines – technical things which are important, but I don’t think they change the way I feel in a scene.
I’m not an actor who consciously accesses bits of my life, in order to play parts. Obviously, you don’t need to have been a father to play one, otherwise everyone who’s been a father would be able to act.
