Gabriel Byrne
Gabriel Byrne
Gabriel James Byrneis an Irish actor, film director, film producer, writer, cultural ambassador and audiobook narrator. His acting career began in the Focus Theatre before he joined London's Royal Court Theatre in 1979. Byrne's screen debut came in the Irish soap opera The Riordans and the spin-off show Bracken. He has now appeared in over 35 feature films, including Excalibur, Miller's Crossing, The Usual Suspects, Stigmata, End of Days, Spider, Jindabyne, Vampire Academyand The 33, and co-wrote The Last of...
NationalityIrish
ProfessionMovie Actor
Date of Birth12 May 1950
CityWalkinstown, Ireland
CountryIreland
Being listened to and being heard is an experience that doesn't happen terribly often. To listen compassionately or nonjudgmentally to another person - not to get too heavy about it - but I once heard somebody say that was a form of real prayer.
I would love to go back to any time in European history, especially in Irish history, to the second or third century, prior to the arrival of Christianity when Paganism flourished. I can always go back there in my imagination, of course. It doesn't cost anything, and it's a form of time travel, I suppose.
He was a tremendous observer of the idiocies of life and brought them brilliantly to the screen and the stage.
The person I was with was organizing my birthday party, and also happens to be a good friend of mine, who is a married woman. If you don't mind, drop the Post. What they indicated was a complete concoction.
Would I have been better off as a teacher in Ireland or Spain? It's a very difficult question to answer. You take the road and you travel along it. I probably would do the same thing again.
I never went to drama school, but I did learn a couple of things along the way.
I think that when we look at something that's well acted and a story that's well told, it allows us to be a mirror of who we are as human beings and as a culture, and offers a glimpse of where we're headed.
No actor who's any good can say truthfully to themselves, 'Yeah, I'm good; I've got this sorted.'
I'm a product of my Irish culture, and I could no more lose that than I could my sense of identity.
The difference that a drama group or a cinema club can make to a small village or a town. It opens people up to ideas, potential about themselves that really, in a way, education often fails to. It's a way of drawing a community together.
Generally speaking, I don't think people know a great deal about the Viking culture, apart from the label that is usually attached to them, either pillagers or deviants who came and brought back loot to Norway. It was an incredibly sophisticated, complex and layered culture. They had their own laws, many of which protected women.
I don't disrespect anybody who espouses a particular religion or belief - that is their own right to do that. But I think it's terribly important to look beyond the comfort that religion gives.
The Catholic Church is an innately conservative rock - they call themselves the 'rock of Peter' - and its resistance to change is, ironically, what has kept it constant throughout the ages.
I think that if you can convey a kind of a complexity, a mystery, a truth in stillness, that, to me, is really worth striving for, and I totally agree with Michael Fassbender in that less is more. If it's going on inside you, the camera will find it.