The cinema is a very truthful medium because the camera doesn't let you get away with anything. On stage, you can even loaf a little, if you're so inclined.
The theater's a live thing, and film is, to some extent, a discipline where you're putting everything together and trying to execute something exactly. You do it away from people and then you present it at the end.
Maybe it's a bit snobby, but it's as if you're a proper actor if you do stage.
Writing is the place where I can do it all and get away with it. You can't do that in the theatre.
I do prefer the stage. It's really the granddaddy of them all.
I'm doing the shows. The stage is my canvas; I'll put whatever up there for the visible eye.
In 1949 there was a new thing called Television, to which my agency and advisers opposed as a performance medium.
I don't make any distinction between a popular TV series or blockbuster film and doing Shakespeare. They're different, but as long as the material is good and the intention is honourable, it's all the same to me.
I think I'm becoming more relaxed in front of a camera. I suppose I'll always feel slightly more at home on stage. It's more of an actor's medium. You are your own editor, nobody else is choosing what is being seen of you.
In theater, you sometimes can only do one or two jobs a year because they're long periods. In film, you can shoot so many. It's quite interesting.
No one ever said movies are for developing your range. Hardly anyone gets that opportunity. Which is why I think the stage is so good. It's less bread, but you can play different types, and you can initiate your own projects.
Stage is the most exciting. Film is lovely, because it's like a family.
On stage, everyone stays put; the vantage point is always the vantage point, and you have to play to the size of the house. And of course, on film, there's different angles, different shots, so that determines how animated or how still you must be.
I have absolutely no preference on TV or stage. Every job I take or that I audition for all comes down to the quality of the script.
Stage performance is obviously a much grander sort of depiction. The audience isn't right in your face as close as a camera lens gets.
I've always just gone with the best role, and I don't care if it's in theater, film or television.
I think for acting on stage and in film, one informs the other. Obviously, they require really different kinds of discipline and really different kinds of work. It's more along the same continuum, for me.
Films are a whole new world that I'm excited to explore. But being on stage is very close to my heart; it has given me a sense of belonging. I will always try to find a way to balance both.
Good acting is good acting, whether it's on stage, on TV, or in films.
There are a lot of pros to doing a film, as far as it helping your film career, and it is completely different financially. But theatre is the only place where you get to actually be the character, and nobody is going to come around and change it later.
TV and films are same for me. I took a decision to be an actor, and I am an actor. I never decided to be TV actor or film actor.
I have always been of the mind that good work is good work, whether performed on stage, on television or in film and, like any reasonable actor, I keep my options open.
I preferred delivering my performance in person. I liked to be in control. You couldn't be in films.
After I did television, I just felt I didn't have any more to give to the medium. And so I went back to the theatre and started directing and producing, and found I enjoyed it as much, if not more, than acting.
Performance art is the ultimate in creativity. Since it has so many possibilities at creativity, it's essence tends to become creativity.
