James Arthur Quotes

If you think about it, I was at college, and then three months later, I was a massive pop star. It's stress-making, especially when you're a bit of an oddball as I was, the black sheep left to your own devices, and then suddenly everyone's interested in you.

Somebody somewhere decided to put me on TV without really thinking twice about it.

When you're so out there in the public eye, people are constantly criticizing every aspect about you.

The press gave me a voice too quickly, and that could have unsettled a man who had every right to feel he should be in control of the thing he had created.

If you feel uncomfortable about something, just because you're in the public eye, it doesn't mean it doesn't hurt when people say things.

I never really got any attention until I was on MTV. I became a household name because I was on every day from 3-4 P.M. I wasn't prepared for it - how mean they can be in the press.

Fame can be just so annoying because people are so critical of you. You can't just say, 'hi'. You say hi and people whisper' man did you see the way she said hi? What an attitude.

When you suddenly appear on the scene and you are the new face, everything centers on you. I experienced this in my mid-20s and I found it rather hard.

I just know that on TV or off TV, I've been very much targeted and torn apart.

Everything kind of happened like: 'Bam!' for me. One minute I was living on a council estate somewhere, then I won the Mercurys, then all of a sudden press and people were in my face.

I'm going to get criticized my whole career.

I know what's it like when everyone has a go at you, when criticism is harsh, and your family is part of it. This drags you down, and you can't get on with your life.

Free got famous fast, and it was a shock. You're working towards it, and when you suddenly get it with bells on, it is a bit much. I don't know how well I dealt with it.

Once you've been in the public eye, you are always going to be criticised.

For all the benefits of being in the public eye, there is the odd downside, too. Twitter goes mad sometimes with people saying weird stuff. It is a bit strange, but you can just ignore them. It is not even worth getting worked up about.

Believe it or not, fame is not as glamorous as it seems. I think it is much harder now with all of the media outlets, and people can be pretty nasty and harsh.

All criticism hurts me. I'm so in the wrong business.

I got booed off the stage one time. This was in a University in Florida. The students didn't know that I had to come back out 6 more times, because I was hosting the show. They just thought that I was a comedian opening the show.

As an actor, you have to face the public all the time. It is a job that people fantasies, but it also creates prejudices; these prejudices are the scariest things. People judge a personal life or your image, and it can affect the characters I play. Therefore, I try not to showcase my personal life too much.

I'm neurotic in the sense that I can have a crowd of 300 people cheering you, applauding you, standing O, but one guy come out of the audience and go, "Hey man, you should have cut 20 minutes. That wasn't so good." And I'll just obsess on that one guy. After all this love, I'll obsess on him and want to smash his face in and strangle him and kick him down the stairs and I'll be pouting about that one guy all night.

No matter how much I'm on and people are loving me, there's always some like, and it's usually a woman too, in the audience rolling her eyes, "Oh Wayne, you're embarrassing yourself." There's always someone like that.

All of a sudden, when you're exposed to a large audience, they think you just started writing that day, but I started years before. I look back at things I wrote then and I'm so embarrassed - the writing seems so blocky and choppy to me and I wouldn't have wanted success any sooner because the writing was even worse.

I've been a performer in the public eye for many years now and it's much darker. It feels so worse now. It feels heavy; it's difficult to deal with. The hatred is unbelievable, but I actually feel a lot more compassion for the journalists and people who aren't used to that. At least on some level, it's been a part of my world for a long time, so I can handle it. I'm not going to say that I'm used to it, because I'm not. I think it's really difficult for people who are just doing journalism and receiving death threats on a very consistent basis.

The fame thing is interesting because I never wanted to be famous, and I never dreamt I would be famous....You know I didn't think they'd rake through my bins, I didn't expect to be photographed on the beach through long lens. I never dreamt it would impact my daughter's life negatively, which at times it has. It would be churlish to say there's nothing good about being famous; to have a total stranger walk up to you as you're walking around Safeways, and say a number of nice things that they might say about your work.

I respect people who are willing to deal with everything that comes with being a politician, but I'm not willing to deal with half the country rooting for you to fail. I'm a singer; I deal with enough. But at least half the country's not trying to destroy me.