Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje Quotes

Unless it's a specific accent, or something about physicality you have to change, I am generally not such a conscious actor.

As an actor you make choices that are either right or wrong, and you find the ones that are right for you. As an understudy, the choices have been made, so you have to make those choices right. Going into the role, you can't really question it.

There's a wonderful adage in acting that you're stuck with the character, but the character is also stuck with you.

I think it always helps when you build a character, and then, you actually step into that character's wardrobe, something else happens. Another angle of the character comes to life.

As an actor, I know it is my job to shape myself for a role - any role.

Any actor would love to just pick up a script and be like, 'I can connect to this person, and I can see myself playing him.'

It kind of varies. I don’t have a method yet. It depends on the script and the character I think I need. I’ve worked with acting coaches, researched roles, and channeled different parts of myself. It’s on a case-by-case for me, right now.

I had the prosthetics on, and I went to my trailer, I looked in the mirror, and I smiled. And I was, like, "This is the character - everything she does is with a smile and a bit of glee and joy." And that's how I created Darla [from Buffy The Vampire Slayer]. Prior to that, I was, like, "I have no idea how to play this 400-year-old vampire from hell!".

I guess because I pay so much attention to the physical part of the character, I don't look upon it as like Charlize Theron up there. I don't think of them as like Charlize Theron films.

I never like to refer back to anything I've done when I'm working on a character, even if that character has the same occupation.

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

In every character you play, as much as you hate to admit it as an actor, but there's an element of you that you bring to it.

I guess I'm probably a Method actor; I don't know... I just think of it as staying in the zone.

I don't act in the way other actresses act, in terms of building or creating a character. I don't transform myself into the role, I invest myself in the role.

I don't bring my life into a character at all.

If I have an audition, I go to the audition in character. I'm in character when I walk in the room. I mean, I'm still sweet to everyone, but I'm very much the character.

Actors pull from their own experiences to bring reality to the characters. I wouldn't want to play someone who's a lot like me. There would be no turning it on or off.

I've done a few costume dramas, and people say, 'What was it like wearing the costumes? Did they really help you with your character?,' and most of the time it doesn't make any difference. You're wearing something a bit weird, and it's sort of uncomfortable, but it doesn't really have a huge impact on the part that you're playing.

For me and for I'm sure any actor, each role is a different challenge to prepare for in a different way.

Suffice it to say, every actor works differently. Laurence Olivier would put on his costume and when the wardrobe was right, he was in character. That sounds superficial, but it's true, and look at the results.

An actor is an actor is an actor. The less personality an actor has off stage the better. A blank canvas on which to draw the characters he plays.

Method acting is a label I don't really understand, because there's a method to everybody's acting.

I have a hard time watching films and not thinking how I would play any part, whether it's a man or a woman.

I tend to - every time I step onto the set until the time I go back to the hotel, I just try to be in character all the time.

I'm not a method actor, but I'm affected by the life I share my life with during shooting. It's always a very strange and special period for me.