Having started in theatre, for a long time I wanted to be a classical actress. But I've always loved making people laugh - at school, I was quite mischievous, and bit by bit, I found myself working more and more in comedy.
In high school, I was one of the cofounders of New Kids on the Block my freshman year in high school. But I also started studying theatre in high school my freshman year as well. So throughout high school, I was actually doing both.
Free speech means the right to shout 'theatre' in a crowded fire.
Musical theatre is something that I always wanted to be a part of, and my first ever role on the West End as Joseph in 'Joseph And The Technicolor Dreamcoat' gave me a taste for it.
It's good to have a foothold in reality, a base somewhere that's always been a base. Sharman Macdonald once said she needs life to write; she can't write if she's just in theatre all the time. I'm the same way, I think. I've always felt that if my life was all about the job, I wouldn't be so good at the job.
Feudal societies don't create great cinema; we have great theatre. The egalitarian societies create great cinema. The Americans, the French. Because equality is sort of what the cinema deals with. It deals with stories which don't fall into 'Everybody in their place and who's who,' and all that. But the theatre's full of that.
I enjoy theatre tremendously, and there's nothing like a live performance.
Theatre is castigated for wallowing in self-indulgence, but it's curiously unsentimental. You simply have to move on. Everything passes. Something in me likes that.
I want to be engaged and moved by theatre, there's nothing more disappointing than being left cold. After 'The Author,' I felt wrung out emotionally, like a used tissue.
I had a teacher who loved movies. He had a little theatre called The Flick, and he would let a bunch of us volunteer to work there, and he also let us make little movies in class.
It is hard to get good actors who also do television, ads and films. Theatre requires six weeks of rehearsal for a play.
I was an usher at the Lyric Theatre Hammersmith. You had to watch whatever play they had on 40 times.
Theatre critics have no special access to the truth. And there should be no objective truth to art.
I know what it's like to have a young child at the weekend and feel like there is nothing to see in the movie theatre. Family is so important.
I'm probably only going to make 10 movies, so I'm already planning on what I'm going to do after that. That's why I'm counting them. I have two more left. I want to stop at a certain point. What I want to do, basically, is I want to write novels, and I want to write theatre, and I want to direct theatre.
I grew up performing in theatre.
You are constantly looking for ways to do something you haven't done before, whether it's a particular role or doing theatre. As a person, I'm really open to experience.
Musical theatre is now a worldwide conversation.
I'd like to think that we strive in film and theatre to tell great stories, and I believe in the power of storytelling in our culture.
As much as the mystery element is all a lot of fun, when you do go to 'Edwin Drood,' you're going to a theatre to see a show about going to a theatre and what that relationship between actors and audiences has been for years.
I came out of drama school thinking I'd do some theatre, maybe some television, and maybe, someday, a film.
When I was at the Royal Ballet School, I remember receiving my first eyeshadow palette from Marks & Spencer as a gift. It sparked my interest in beauty, which peaked when I became more involved in theatre and got to experience so many stunning image transformations to suit different productions.
I'm not sure I approve of theatre as a university course. I think theatre's something you do. I mean, literature is a subject; theatre is practical.
I was a football player at college and dislocated my thumb. I was out for a bit and passed the theatre and saw some lovely drama students walking into an audition for 'Much Ado About Nothing' and thought: 'That's what I'll do when I recover.' I joined that production and was hooked.
I sometimes think that theatre is a torture.
I'm an odd mixture. I'm a sort of Geordie punk who started in classical theatre. It means nobody ever knows quite where to put me, but I like that.
Performing on stage is my first love - it's why I wanted to be an actor in the first place - and 'Arcadia' is the highlight of my career so far. I love the intimacy of a live theatre audience - you can really squeeze every last drop out of each scene.
When I was young, football and theatre were the only places I was happy. I remember school as just what happened in between the things that I liked.
To be honest, I was never really interested in theatre as a kid.
Part of what I enjoy about the theatre and acting is that sense of history.
My background is somewhat unusual, as I trained to be a ballet dancer. I worked in the theatre for eight or nine years as a contemporary dancer. But as an actor one does read Shakespeare and does try to learn the classics.
My unworldliness, even at 21, was abnormal. Not only had I never smoked tobacco nor touched alcohol of any description, but I had never yet set foot inside a theatre, or gone to a race course I had never seen, nor held a billiard cue, nor touched a card.
After graduating from National School of Drama, I started doing theatre in Delhi. But there was not much money in Hindi theatre.
As far as I'm concerned, Cate Blanchett is a goddess, but she's really down to earth. She's got all those Oscars, she's made all those amazing films and she could spend her whole life doing that, but what does she also do? She gives birth to three boys and creates her own theatre in Sydney.
I used to spend a lot of time at football training, but that time was later spent in amateur acting classes and my local youth theatre, in plays at school and after-school clubs. That filled the void.
I think it's sad that movies and television have caused the theatre to fade as a popular art form. I hope to get young people into the theatre and expose them to Shakespeare.
