Anthony Hopkins
Anthony Hopkins
Sir Philip Anthony Hopkins, CBE, is a Welsh actor of film, stage, and television. After graduating from the Royal Welsh College of Music & Drama in 1957, he trained at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in London, and was then spotted by Laurence Olivier who invited him to join the Royal National Theatre. In 1968, he got his break in film in The Lion in Winter, playing King Richard the Lionheart...
NationalityWelsh
ProfessionMovie Actor
Date of Birth31 December 1937
CityMargam, Wales
It's very difficult to liberate yourself from what you've learned. You know it's almost impossible because you learn in order to survive.
When you're younger you've got a lot of ideas and you're probably more insecure. I work with young actors now and I see their insecurities, and I make them laugh because I know exactly what they're going through. When you get older you think, it's only a movie after all, it's not brain surgery.
I've always liked American actors particularly. Because that was my first impression. I was very enamoured of America when I was a kid because we were surrounded by American soldiers during the war, the accent was very strange to me, it was very exotic and very captivating.
I watched a film with a very famous, great, great actor, I won't mention his name because everyone loves his memory, but I thought, "God he was acting a lot." Great actor, but nonstop acting. Wall to wall, fitted-carpet acting.
I wanted to be a musician. I just wanted to be famous because I wanted to escape from what I felt was my limitation in life. I wanted to write music and I didn't know what I was doing and I never had the technique or the understanding of it. But I've always played the piano, and I can improvise on the piano. The problem is that I can't write down what I play. I can read music but I can't write it down.
I like to work. I don't like to disrupt my equilibrium. I don't like to change my head. I'd rather be a third-rate actor. It's a job, and I'm dedicated in my way. I enjoy it. I'm serious about it. But if it doesn't come off, I'm not going to die.
I became an actor because I didn't know what else to do. Academically, I wasn't good.
People ask me how did you choose the part and how did you prepare for this work? I just learned the lines and showed up; I don't know what else to say because that's all I know how to do.
I don't like mushiness. I'm a very emotional person but I hate sentimentality. I don't like great demonstrations of emotion. But as I'm getting older, I'm getting much more open about all that.
My weak spot is that I don't like analyzing so I tend to be a bit lazy; I tend to get bored quickly, which means I must be boring.
I love to have a laugh. I like to tease people.
We're all different. Some people are musicians, some people are actors, some people are agents and some people are accountants... We're all different.
You have to have humor. If you don't have humor and you take yourself seriously, you're dead in the water. You have to be jostled. I love it. You've gotta have a laugh. It's better than working for a living.
I'm not being cynical but when you're doing a movie you have a number to choices to do as an actor. But then you see it all cut together and some of the little...all those little precious pieces you put in maybe on the cutting room floor. So you don't have that much control. You have very little control, in fact.