Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
When Shakespeare doesn't feel like Shakespeare, it's the best.
I much prefer to work with dead writers, and ones who were writing four hundred years ago.
There's nothing like a great piece of theater - a great performance in a great piece of theater.
The camera kind of finds things that the naked eye can't even see. By moving in a certain way, you're already telling part of the story.
If you cast your supporting cast well, it should be seamless. You shouldn't even notice who's a big part and who's a small part. A good cast enriches everything.
People grow and change and develop through their experiences, so ultimately you have to go with what's in the room - the feeling you get from them and what the camera picks up.
I don't have a particular genre that I want to stick to; if you work on a small piece, you take that experience with you when you work on a big piece and vice versa. You will take those experiences with you and they will make the next one richer.
I've got Tom Hiddleston playing Henry V. I don't want to have a bowl haircut. I want him looking good so, you know, I want him in delicious kind of tight fitting leather jackets. [] I don't want him in tights, so he got nice leather trousers in mine.
I ran the Gate in Notting Hill for a while, which is where Stephen Daldry started out. Those theaters are magical, because there's no money, so in a way there're no boundaries and it allows you to be inventive and brave and take risks and all those important things while you're starting out.
I love working with people I've worked with before and that can be true of when people have worked together. But if two people have a natural chemistry and it just works, to be there for the first time, particularly on a story where it's about these two people meeting for the first time, that goes a long way.
When you're casting, you have to do quite a bit of research. But I always think you have to do it with a pinch of salt with actors, because it's so unfair to pigeonhole them and so often they are. I try to be as open as possible and if people are really interested and really want to have a go, then let's get them in and see them.
I never really felt aware of my gender, being a woman, and whether that was in my favor or not. Because there's nothing I can do about that. I'm also really grateful to my parents for having brought me up to feel that equality is just something you take for granted. I hope that our generation will really change that. I think there's a long way to go.
It takes such a particular amazing and extraordinary type of personality to become an actor. I love them. You can't do my job without them. I've worked with a lot of film actors and most of them are so, so prepared in their approach because they are used to turning up ready to shoot: you have to have your performance, you have to have your lines, you have to have everything pretty much decided and ready to go whenever everyone else is ready.