Olivia Colman Quotes

If the script's good, everything you need is in there. I just try and feel it, and do it honestly. I also don't learn things for auditions, because I feel like it's just a test of memorizing rather than being real. Maybe every other actor would think that was terrible, I don't know. But it seems to have worked for me, so far.

I find talking about acting very boring, having to come out with platitudes about how terribly nice everyone is. I would much rather just do it.

For me, acting is doing.

I just arrive, they hand me a script and say, do it.

I don't know what acting is, but I enjoy it.

I'm good with a script.

It's fun finding your way to the performance instead of coming in and hoping to God you're impressing the director - and hoping you're delivering the lines right with no treatment beforehand.

For any role, I pretty much always go to the script, first and foremost.

I don't like being away from theater that long. The muscles get atrophied if you don't exercise them.

I'd also like to do a play. I've never done theater, and constantly changing and refining a performance is something I'd like to do, even though it may sound like work to some people - and it probably is work.

What you learn from studying acting is that you have to have the courage to just make strong choices.

I'm always looking, as an actor, for activities. I think it's far more interesting to watch what people do than what they say. You always want to watch behavior, because the dialogue as written by our illustrious leaders is great. Eminently playable.

Having done a lot of theater, I'm used to sustaining characters over long periods of time.

To have an opportunity to get in front of a camera every single day is just priceless because it gets you closer and closer to being less self-consciousness in front of it and really being human and really making choices and standing by them.

I've never committed to a role without a script.

Good acting is about being as natural and calm as possible. These days producers have such definite ideas that you have to be prepared to do whatever they ask.

People ask me, 'How do you remember your lines?' That's nothing. That is the least of my concerns.

Script for an actor is like a bible. You carry it with you, you read it over and over, you go to your passages.

Some scenes you juggle two balls, some scenes you juggle three balls, some scenes you can juggle five balls. The key is always to speak in your own voice. Speak the truth. That's Acting 101. Then you start putting layers on top of that.

All the things you can do to prepare for a role that free you, in the moment, are great. You have this muscle memory for things. You don't have to act it as much, once you've done it enough.

What I do is just go over and over and over my lines and learn the script so well that I can just be easy and relaxed. That's the way I always work.

I think my best teacher and my best study was theater in general. It taught me a lot of patience and a lot of hard work, and I think that theater teaches you that you've got to know your stuff because you only get one chance.

Basically, the actor's job is to pay attention to the script.

As an actor, you don't know what is going to come next.

Acting is really scary, but it's also challenging, fun, hard work. There's always an element of improvisation with every actor, even when something is really scripted.