If the script's good, everything you need is in there. I just try and feel it, and do it honestly. I also don't learn things for auditions, because I feel like it's just a test of memorizing rather than being real. Maybe every other actor would think that was terrible, I don't know. But it seems to have worked for me, so far.
Interpretation
The quote emphasizes the importance of authenticity and instinct in acting over rote memorization.
Olivia Colman reflects on her approach to acting, suggesting that a well-written script contains all the necessary elements for a performance. She expresses her preference for embodying the character honestly rather than merely memorizing lines for auditions, which she feels compromises the authenticity of the portrayal. Her method may not align with traditional expectations, but it has proven effective for her career.
In practice
During an acting workshop, this quote can be shared to inspire students to trust their instincts.
When you've got children, it's easy to do that thing of keeping a tally of who woke up earliest and whose turn it is to put them to bed. But I think the important thing is to appreciate and love each other and to show that appreciation.
I had a lovely, feral, free childhood - out and then come back when you're hungry or it gets too dark. I feel slightly cruel that I'm not offering my children the same.
My mum was a nurse, and her passion was geriatric care. I used to love listening to the old people's stories in her nursing home and picturing myself in their place. They'd say, 'I went to school in a horse and cart,' and I'd just think 'Wow!' I'd picture myself in their place - acting was a natural progression.
That's the magic of art and the magic of theatre: it has the power to transform an audience, an individual, or en masse, to transform them and give them an epiphanal experience that changes their life, opens their hearts and their minds and the way they think.
If you want to make a documentary you should automatically go to the fiction, and if you want to nourish your fiction you have to come back to reality.
Watch out for music. It should come with a health warning. It can be dangerous. It can make you feel so alive, so connected to the people around you, and connected to what you really are inside. And it can make you think that the world should, and could, be a much better place. And just occasionally, it can make you very, very happy.
When I write I can shake off all my cares. My sorrow disappears, my spirits are revived.
The unsatisfied yearning of the artist reaches back to the primordial image in the unconscious which is best fitted to compensate the inadequacy and one-sidedness of the present.
I don't often go to curator or artist walk-throughs of exhibitions. For a critic, it feels like cheating. I want to see shows with my own eyes, making my own mistakes, viewing exhibitions the way most of their audience sees them.
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