Tom Hooper
Tom Hooper
Thomas George "Tom" Hooper is a British film and television director of English and Australian background. Hooper began making short films as a teenager, and had his first professional short, Painted Faces, broadcast on Channel 4 in 1992. At Oxford University Hooper directed plays and television commercials. After graduating, he directed episodes of Quayside, Byker Grove, EastEnders and Cold Feet...
NationalityBritish
ProfessionDirector
Date of Birth1 October 1972
thinking people childhood
I think the thumb print on the throat of many people is childhood trauma that goes unprocessed and unrecognized.
thinking patriotism film
I think English film is very embarrassed by patriotism, generally.
thinking silence emptiness
I began to think that if you're a stutterer, it's about inhabiting silence, emptiness, and nothingness.
thinking people enjoy
I think people enjoy finding out something genuinely new.
thinking gold directors
I think directors can become overly infatuated by gilt and gold, and the word 'lavish' and everything being magnificent.
thinking scary intellectual
There's something about being cerebral, intellectual, and yet emotionally repressed [in being villain]. If you think someone's doing this [bad] stuff and they're in complete control, that's more scary than if they're out of control.
thinking actors body
Sometimes your body language is enough for an actor to know that you're not happy. And you don't really need to say it out loud if you deal with actors you know very well. And I don't think you really need to be explicit.
block thinking self
I think we all have blocks between us and the best version of ourselves, whether it's shyness, insecurity, anxiety, whether it's a physical block, and the story of a person overcoming that block to their best self. It's truly inspiring because I think all of us are engaged in that every day.
affected dad growing learn lost
When I was growing up my mother would say, 'Your dad may have to learn about being a father because he lost his own and that would have affected him'.
anyone learned listen lose therapy wants
What I learned about stammering was that, when as a young child you lose the confidence of anyone who wants to listen to you, you lose confidence in your voice and the right to speech. And a lot of the therapy was saying, 'You have a right to be heard.'
afford directing hardest life unlike variety work year
The hardest part of directing is the choosing. Unlike an actor who can do a variety of work, it is a year of your life, you can't afford to get it wrong.
background lenses quite shoot tend
If you look at classic Hollywood films, they tend to shoot close-ups on quite long lenses and the background it out of focus. You know, it's just a mush.
failure films men seem
My films seem to be about men's struggle with failure.
great work
The more and more I work with really great actors, the more it's about opening yourself up to what they bring.