Ben Nicholas Quotes

I usually can find a way to do a character to make it real and work. But sometimes it's a struggle sustaining that, because there's such a level of personal involvement and personal, physical, and emotional distraughtness.

When I play a villain, I usually get home and sleep straight through the night. It's physically and emotionally draining.

Every actor has to love and loathe the character he plays.

When you're entertaining all day long and that's your work, you end up really very tired. You don't have a lot of energy left over for your loved ones.

Do you know how hard it is to play a character where you're always in heels? Oh, my goodness!

'Black Sails' was an amazing experience, but it was a really tough show for me to do. After four years, it was pretty exhausting because it was such a huge production.

I do not want to work to stay busy. I want to feel excited and challenged with each character that I portray on-screen.

Putting together two powerful sets is always difficult. After you really pour it out one night, it's hard to pour it out the next night.

Performing is an exchange of a lot of energy and it can wipe you out.

Acting always affects every part of your life because it's such a solitary, lonely, and thrilling circumstance that you're taking on someone else's character and that responsibility. It's exhausting.

The darker, more complex and emotional the part is, the easier it is for me. But I don't take any of that stuff home with me at the end of the day.

You're playing a role, but you're still feeling it. You can walk away from it after 'Cut,' but if you're playing a sad or mixed-up person, it's hard to stay in that place for these longish period of times. You kind of have to check out.

You have to like the characters you play.

Creating a character and living truthfully through her is a whole different ball game. It's all part of the same person but it's a much newer medium for me.

I was lucky enough to be able to do comedies, dramas, completely different parts. At the beginning, when you start you have a fantasy that you could be somebody else. Which is absurd. That's part of being an actor. It's your voice, it's the way you move, it's your body, even if you transform it, you play with it.

Seeing The English Patient is wonderfully draining, but imagine acting in it for six months.

Yeah, I think the common denominator - and this is probably going to sound like Acting 101 - but the common denominator is belief in the character in the moment.

It is definitely a challenge to play Nathan, but the more different he is from myself, the more interesting the character becomes for me.

The emotional stakes a memoirist bets with could not be higher, and it's physically enervating. I nap on a daily basis like a cross-country trucker.

I love playing characters, so I'm always telling my agents, 'Don't worry if the character description is something you think I'm not. Let me try to be that person.'

The best advice my dad ever gave me is that acting is believing. Acting is not acting. It isn't putting on a face and dancing around in a mask. It's believing that you are that character and playing him as if it were a normal day in the life of that character.

When you are developing a character you have to bring so much of yourself to the role.

Every time you play a bad girl or guy in a movie, you really come from a place of pain.

It's hard to actually take details from your personal life and apply them a scene because, as much as you can identify with a feeling, you just get muddled. As soon as you start bringing your own stuff in, it's like, 'No, that's not right.' You're playing a different person. You can relate, but you have to leave that stuff at the door.

There is a general notion that playing a bubbly girl is undemanding and less challenging. But that's not the case. You need oodles of energy to bring out the spirit of a lively character. Besides, no two bubbly girls are the same. Every character I have played is different from the other. I love being chosen for such lively roles.