Quotes from Michael Fassbender

I'm always interested in trying to investigate different personalities. I want to keep myself guessing and keep the fear element alive, so that I don't get too comfortable.

Everything I put my name to and take part in, I want to be good. That's not saying it will always happen. But I want to make bold choices.

Even if I'm playing a superhero, it has to be steeped in reality.

I suppose the doctor-patient relationship has that idea of transference. I think it's a special thing that doctors have. We all find doctors sexy. That's why there are so many TV shows about doctors.

We did a lot of that in drama school: intellectualising and maybe justifying your position. 'I am a thinking actor and I have thought this through' - well, just do it. I much prefer the doing aspect.

You want society to accept you; but you can't even accept yourself.

When I was four, I just wanted to drive, I collected toy cars. Where does that sort of thing come from? In hindsight you go, 'Oh, liked it because of this.' Maybe it's just the wheel.

I keep everything very simple. I like telling stories.

I always approach film as a fan.

Why not provoke some thought and get people talking about things? I like characters that are flawed because we all are. When people break up in a script, you think, Oh, right, there must be tears shed here. But maybe the fact of the matter is that they're both laughing.

There's no point thinking, 'Well, my life's certainly worked out, I've got all the answers.' It would be wrong for me to say that I don't get seduced by certain things. That things don't become tempting.

I came to Los Angeles and did auditions for television. I made a terrible mess of most of them and I was quite intimidated. I felt very embarrassed and went back to London. I got British television jobs intermittently between the ages of 23 and 27, but it was very patchy.

'Hunger' definitely changed my life, in terms of being recognized by filmmakers, since that was very much a filmmakers' film.

If there's friends around, I'll cook. Or if I have a girlfriend. But on my own I kind of fell out of the habit of it, and it's a shame really because I know it's good for me. It's something quite therapeutic.

I don't think peroxide-blond hair is a beneficial look for me.

Magneto has a whole lot of complexity to him. Emotionally, he's coming from a very damaged place. I like the ambivalence of it. I want the audience leaving the theater wondering, asking the questions themselves rather than being spoon-fed like a lot of these super-villain characters.

There's so much going on in the world. There's so much information being thrown at us - so many things are being sold to us, and we're being told how we should appear and how to be more successful, blah, blah, blah. How does that manifest itself? In the pressures, the stress, this need to escape.

We feel a lot of pressure about looking silly or appearing weak, whatever that means, or being a failure. You have to keep in your head: what's the worst that can happen?

My goal was for acting to become my main income. I would say to myself, 'I'm good enough.' That became my mantra.

People are complicated. Our behavior towards one another is strange. So I like opportunities to investigate that.

Why does a three-year-old, and it's usually boys, want to drive the tractor or have machinery and be in control of it? I don't know. Why wouldn't you ask to boil a kettle or something? Maybe you would, I dunno.

It's more interesting isn't it, if I've got a hedonistic dark side?

What I find really interesting is to try and mix it up, to push myself and try different things. I don't want to stay in my comfort zone. I want to take risks and keep myself scared.

Nobody wants to hear Metallica at lunchtime.