Natalie Dormer Quotes

If I'm playing a real-life person, I would take notes, I think that's important. For instance, when I played Rosemary Clooney, I was lucky enough to meet her; thankfully, she was still with us. And I talked with her and read her book, so when it's a real person, I want to find out everything I can.

What's nice about playing somebody real is that generally there's more information about them, so a lot of the questions that you'd otherwise have to make up the answers to are already there.

It's obvious that if you're going to play a character you need to amass information about that person and about their environment or their era that they're in and use as little or as much as necessary.

It took me 13 months just to prepare for 'M.S. Dhoni'... I started by watching every single video I could find of his, repeatedly. After three months, people who met me started saying that they could see similarities, and I knew I was on the right path.

I like as much time as I can get and I'll do whatever I think is helpful to prepare for a role. Sometimes it's practical research, meaning if I had to write shorthand, I'd learn how to write shorthand. Or if I have to know how to dance a certain way, I would learn that. And then there's just research of talking to people similar to the characters I'm playing. And there's stuff that I just feel is inspiring, whether it be music or a painting or a photograph. I've used a lot of Nan Goldin's photos in the past to inspire me. I use certain paintings and pieces of music.

I'm not an actor who approaches films doing a lot of research. I do zero research, unless it's a film where I'm playing a mock version of someone who already existed. Then, you've got to do a lot of research.

I'm not the kind of actor who goes into exhaustive research for each role.

One of the joys about acting is researching.

Actors look at life in a different way. When I meet people, I know that one day I may portray that person or someone like them. It may be a cop or a homeless guy. It helps you to pay more attention to people. Everyone I meet, I retain something from them, something from their personality. It helps me to portray realism in my work.

A lot of actors talk about doing their homework, but very few of them do it.

To play Hillary Clinton? I'm kind of winging it. No, are you kidding me? I prepared obsessively. I mean, as much as I could in the time that I was given. Of course, with someone like Hillary Clinton, obviously, anything you want is on YouTube and at your fingertips there.

I'd like to play with a period piece. Playing a girl next door in 2010 is so different from playing one in 1950, the way you talk, walk, dress, relationships. It's really fun studying all that.

Any sort of role requires a certain amount of research and embodiment of the character and psychological investigation.

Playing somebody who's still alive is very interesting.

It's daunting to play a real living person.

With any character I do, I do my due diligence with research.

I played a doctor on 'Counterpart', so that was about studying and watching documentaries and reading and trying to learn.

I like to do a lot of research for my films and live my character.

As an actor, you're used to putting on characters, taking them off, becoming someone else, doing your research, and working on that.

I did a lot before [being cast] because I knew how important it would be for playing somebody real, or attempting to - to show the team [the role] was something I would be fascinated to do. I read a couple of biographies and I watched everything I could find [about princess Margaret].

It's interesting what happens when you take on a role, I think. What happens to me - without sounding too spiritual or too hippy, I guess - what happens, most of the time, you do a lot of research, and you get into the character, and at a certain moment, it's like the character takes over.

My brother Ryan was on the Disney XD show 'Pair of Kings' where he played Lanny, the evil cousin to twin kings, for three seasons. His motivation to be a better actor always pushes me to work harder and try to be more like him. When he gets a role, he will study that character until he becomes that person.

Acting is about portraying something... that dedication or learning the script of it is really important in really getting to know a topic.

I'm always studying actors and movies. You can never not do your homework.

I think the two main tools actors have are the imagination of what other people have gone through, to connect with and through research, and there's one's own experience.