Guy Pearce
Guy Pearce
Guy Edward Pearceis an Australian actor and musician. He is well known for having starred in the role of Mike Young in the Australian television series Neighbours and in films such as The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert, L.A. Confidential, Memento, The Count of Monte Cristo, The Road, The King's Speech, Prometheus, and Iron Man 3. In Australian cinema, he has appeared in The Proposition, Animal Kingdom, The Rover, Holding the Manand The Wizards of Aus. He has...
NationalityEnglish
ProfessionMovie Actor
Date of Birth5 October 1967
CityCambridgeshir, England
Every time you say yes to a film there's a certain percentage of your yes that has to do with the director, a certain percentage to do with the story, a certain percentage with the character, the location, etc...
I want to bring something different to every film. I get a bit tired of actors who kind of are the same character in every film that they do.
I find it really difficult to even articulate things that I've done in the past. I express myself through the characters that I play, not through the articulation of them later.
A lot of action characters are a little bit too serious as well. They take themselves a bit too seriously, which I don't find particularly interesting, whereas I like the fact that there was at least some humor in this because really it's a piece of entertainment.
I feel I do my best work when it's all there on the page, and I feel that the character is very vivid as I read the script and I'm not having to create stuff and trying to cobble together something. If I have to do that, then I don't entirely trust what I'm doing.
I'll generally write out every scene that's in the film on a couple of pieces of paper, just with a little one-line. And then I can scan it a bit and go, 'This first third of the film, generally, I'm kind of calm.' Then I might do something on one piece of paper that just relates to the energy of the character.
I'm a musician, and I'm fascinated with the effects of sound, and tone, and pitch and melody and all that sort of stuff. It's the first thing I have to solidify whenever...I get into a character. The first thing I need to get sorted out before I can then move forward, before I can feel any confidence whatsoever, is the voice.
They actually came to me over a year ago, and I was having an ever-so-mild nervous breakdown at that point, and felt I needed to just stop. So I went, "I can't look at anything right now, I need to stop." I wasn't really having a nervous breakdown, I'd just done too much stuff back to back. And so a whole lot of time went by, and they called and said, "Are you ready now to take a look at this script?" So I did and then met with him in the UK.
Even though we all speak English here in America, you all speak a very different language. So it's really enjoyable for me to work at home. It's more cathartic, I suppose. To work in America or other places is more about curiosity, because I'm dealing with cultures and sensibilities that I don't really know.
I've always been resistant to parties and schmoozing.
I don't understand the actor who plays the same role from movie to movie. Maybe it's because I worked on long-running television when I was in my teens, and so the idea of playing the same role just bores me intensely. I'd rather not do it at all.
On stage, you've got dialogue you've learned. You've got a paying audience. It couldn't be better, you know?
Men often still expect women to be under their thumb.
It's hard to pinpoint why all of a sudden a group of Australian films will be doing well and why they perhaps are better made than some from the past.