Guy Ritchie, he thinks going to drama school is the worst thing in the world.
I was supposed to go to drama school and then go to New York and do theatre. But I grew up on all those fabulous movies and had read all the bold Hollywood books, and I thought I just had to take a look.
I tried twice to get into drama school and didn't, so I worked my way up through the fringe.
I was pre-med, so I was going to go into the family business, more or less. But I came to my senses, luckily, and backed out, and decided to go to drama school.
I left school the day I turned 16, the earliest day I legally could. Determined to follow a life on stage, preferably with some dance connection, I applied for and won a place at the local drama school. I was on my way.
A lot of the films now are more focused on the visuals than on the actors. I think all directors should go to drama school.
When I decided I wanted to go to drama school, I realized that a lot of the actors whose careers I really admire and whose work I really admire were English and English trained. I felt there was a real vocational feel to work in the U.K.
Depending on what your interest in theater is, I always recommend working on plays. It's a great way to be introduced to the field, and also a great way to be seen by agents and representation. I'm also a great advocate for studying acting at a drama school or a college.
I was doing a show at the National Youth Theatre, playing an old man. Before that I had played fat clowns and I thought, 'If I want to have the career I would like, I am going to have to lose weight.' I was just starting drama school, and found I was moving around a lot. I also started to eat sensibly. The weight just dropped off.
Orlando's a really cool guy. They hired him for 'Lord of the Rings' out of drama school. He's very new at this still and doesn't have a lot of experience. So we were in this together and we've tried to help each other out. We felt very equal which was good.
I tested on a lot of TV shows and films after I finished drama school.
When the time came to make a decision about what do in life, I found myself thinking that acting was the thing I loved to do, so I applied to drama school. And then, I didn't get in - twice.
I think if I had come out of drama school and been an instant Hollywood superstar, I would be taking long, leisurely holidays.
Because I didn't go to drama school, I didn't start in the business with any toolbox apart from enthusiasm and instinct. I'd throw everything at a part and sometimes realise that I had hit my limits.
We did a lot of that in drama school: intellectualising and maybe justifying your position. 'I am a thinking actor and I have thought this through' - well, just do it. I much prefer the doing aspect.
About a year after leaving drama school or a year and a half - and I was working solidly ever since leaving drama school - I picked up 'Game of Thrones.'
I started at drama school at 18.
In order to do 'Amores Perros,' I had to skip some time at drama school, so the director Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu came up with a great Latin American solution, which was to say I had a tropical disease and had to stay in Mexico for a while. Everyone believed me.
Before I left home for drama school in England, my father took me outside one night and told me that wherever I was, the moon would shine on both of us. Months later, walking in London, I'd look at the moon and feel his love. Now I've shared the ritual with my own kids.
Even at drama school if there was a part of some eastern European thug it would be me.
'Hollyoaks' is where I learnt a lot of the craft, being in front of a camera six days a week. That's certainly an experience you don't get in drama school. It invites you to be comfortable in front of the camera.
I left the North when I was 21 to go to drama school in London, and I stayed there 12 years.
When I got out of Yale Drama School, I was completely broke.
I don't watch anything of mine much. I haven't gone to drama school, or college, either. I just like to watch other actors in action. I learned so much from working with De Niro. I'd be in a scene with him where I was supposed to be acting, and I was just watching.
I went to an ordinary primary school, and then I started performing in a show called 'Billy Elliot' on the West End, and that was sort of my drama school.
I didn't go to drama school, so I didn't really have many true friends in the business; 'Game Of Thrones' has definitely brought me that.
I joined the Royal Shakespeare Co. with no experience whatsoever - I'd never been to a drama school or anything. But I was strong and could lift things, I could move scenery about.
Drama school was a lifeline for me, it saved me. I found it very nurturing - I just clung on.
My natural accent is American. I chose to speak with a U.K. accent when I was about to enter the final year at drama school in London. I was going to try to find a way to stay in the U.K. after I finished college and could not imagine trying to live and get work there with an American accent.
Drama school introduced me to a world I had no idea about. I wasn't brought up in a literary household at all.
The wonderful thing about drama school is that it stretches you in a way the industry doesn't.
I was incredibly nervous about doing a period drama. I thought that to play period, you had to be English-looking and blonde and very well spoken, and have gone to drama school.
I was kicked out of drama school in 1976, aged 18, for vandalising the headmistress's tyres, after being there for less than a year.
When I was at youth theatre and drama school, I never thought people would mistake me for a stand-up.
There's a huge gulf between people who can afford to go to drama school and those who can't.
I left drama school to do 'The Book Thief' - it was a real trip going straight from school kind of right into it, but I feel like the momentum of being in school put me in a good mindset as far as going into it as a learning experience.
