Quotes from Charles Dance

You have to be selfish to be an actor.

Runners are the lowest of the low in film units. They're paid very, very minimal wages - probably below the national average. And runners are now being asked to drive actors about, as well as their runner duties. It's kind of the same as taking advantage of nurses - it's appalling.

My mother was a waitress in a Lyons Corner House, but she married up. She was keen on bettering herself. She taught me how to use the right knives and forks and behave properly.

I don't like watching television too much; it tires me out for some reason. But I saw a fair bit of 'Game of Thrones' because it was so good. I mostly watched episodes that I wasn't in.

In my home, I listen to music; I play music: I play guitar and I play ukelele. And I swim and I ride a bike and I do all the things that everybody else does.

I think it's counterproductive for actors to come to the set with well-thumbed copies of the book their film is adapted from.

We have to take risks in British television. It has to stop playing to the lowest common denominator and patronising people.

A while ago, I did a television adaptation of 'Bleak House,' and the character I played, as far as I was concerned, had no redeeming features whatsoever. I wasn't about to try to find any; I didn't need to.

Politics is the most corrupt profession on Earth, no matter where you are.

I like approbation. Any actor who tells you they don't is lying.

Most feature films are 35-40 shooting days.

If I was to put a little flag in everywhere I've been in the world, there'd be a lot of little flags.

If I talk about Charles Dance I am talking about something else, something I operate and wind up and have to make an impression with and use to transmit someone else's screenplay.

I was a window dresser for Burton's once. What really put me off was the area manager coming round and saying, Charles, I think you're a natch at this.

I would have liked to have worked with Ralph Richardson and Paul Scofield, but they're dead now.

I've got a range as an actor! There was a time I played dramatic leading men.

We had five goats, two dogs, a cat and racks of commentaries on Shakespeare.

I've never been one for late nights, which is why I have always preferred making films to theatre. A play takes over your life: you start to feel sick at lunchtime, and by mid-afternoon, you're wishing for a bomb scare so the whole thing will be called off. Of course, if the evening goes well and you get the applause, then it's wonderful.

When you have a label stuck on you, people tend to believe it. If someone calls you suave and debonair, you only get offered parts in a suit and a collar and tie. It just so happens I wear them reasonably well.

I spent a lot of time [between takes] apologising to Peter Dinklage [Dance's on-screen son, Tyrion Lannister] because I treat him appallingly.

Most films are written and made with a hero around 35, or even 25.

I love the Restoration. It's a bit like coming out of the John Major era into the optimism of Tony Blair.

Your senses are reeling all the time. Finally you find something to write and the very next day you go out and see something else which totally contradicts what you've written and every conclusion you've come to.

I got a lot of energy from directing the film 'Ladies In Lavender.' You wonder if you have the stamina because as an actor you can lounge around the trailer during the scenes you're not in, but as a director, you're there from first thing in the morning to last thing at night every day of the week. I found it incredibly energising.