Quotes from Rupert Friend

I would say that being open to new things is kind of vital in this line of work, if not all lines of work, and being prepared to embrace the challenge of the new thing is something I want in my life until the day it's over.

It's an imaginative thing we do; it's about immersing oneself in one's imagination. If you're a novelist, you do it with pen and paper. We do it with our bodies.

Growing up in England, you're sort of spoiled, in a way. You sort of take it for granted that within a half-hour's drive, you could be walking around a stately home from the 1700s. It's not very hard to do - in California, you've got to take a flight!

I'm not a big fan of people telling each other what to do, I'll say that.

I have to be absolutely drawn to the project. If you're ashamed or bored by it at the beginning, it's going to be a pretty nightmarish thing.

It's all very brilliant to build bridges and buildings, but long after we're gone, it will be the natural things in this world which will still be here.

There are some great actors I don't want to meet because I don't want to know how they did it. I don't want to know anything about their personal life, and the illusion, or whatever it is, the shape-shiftery magic stuff that they do, which is my joy.

All I would say is that when I've been very down or having kind of a tough time in my life, certain films or pieces of music or books have changed that. They've taken me out of a dark place and put me into a more positive one. And I think that if we can do that for people, then it's certainly worth doing.

Han Solo is more interesting than Superman because he's flawed. Superman's flaw is kryptonite, and that's it. He can make time go backwards, for God's sake, but with Han Solo or Indiana Jones, there's a bit of humanity there.

I think that what drives most of us as human beings is the want for something. You might have a hope, or a big dream, or a goal that you haven't yet achieved.

Seeing, say, 'My Left Foot,' and 'The Last of the Mohicans.' How is that the same person? Or people like Johnny Depp, who can play Jack Sparrow and Edward Scissorhands. I am so interested in the transformation, in not knowing anything about them and watching somebody create a character. I'm not really interested in personalities.

I don't love plays. I don't love doing the same thing, every night, for 100 nights in a row.

It might look like some incredibly complicated map to get from English period films to American action anti-heroes, but it really is just about not having a plan.

I find the English flag - the cross - quite frightening; it has very bad symbolism for me. Not just football hooligans but supremacists and the BNP.

When I come home, all I do is cook. I love cooking, so I go to markets, buy food, cook it for friends. I love doing that.

I've never been to war, and I would never presume to fully understand the horrors that that kind of experience can impart.

I find it easier to approach things from a critical angle that otherwise may seem daunting because I'm used to being scared.

I think you can decide how much of yourself you're willing to make public.

I don't think you can decide how famous or not you become.

Everybody has many people inside of them; I think we tend to present the one we feel is most appropriate at first, in order to gain acceptance or achieve what we want. It gets really interesting when this technique fails, and other levels are revealed.

We have characters in Western television shows who are in full health with shiny hair and shiny teeth, and they go about their lives having minor problems.

The image of all the cars leaving pastel-colored people at the same time has never really left me as an anti-ambition for life!

I don't have a publicist. I don't go to events or self-promote, or endorse things, or whatever it is people are meant to do in that world.

I only do the press for the work. I don't have a publicist. I don't go to events or self-promote or endorse things or whatever it is people are meant to do in that world.