People have to respond to the characters and respond to the situations that they're in. That said, it still has to be a compelling narrative that drives along and keeps people coming back week after week. So really, with any successful show you could name, there has to be a mysterious blend of both of those.

Adam Rayner

Categorized in : You Back Name People

Sometimes our motivations can be quite hazy, contradictory and multi-faceted, in real life.

Adam Rayner

motivation real sometimes

Long gone are the days of the stylised old James Bond films with Roger Moore karate chopping his way through the bad guys - audiences are not going to buy it anymore. The genre has got quite serious now.

Adam Rayner

guy gone long

If somebody knew every time they did something it was going to be a hit there would never be any failures. Sadly, that's not how it works. You take nothing for granted.

Adam Rayner

take-nothing-for-granted granted ifs

We're all waiting for the opportunity to do big films but you have to wait your turn - unless you get offered something like Twilight when you're 20! Otherwise, you just have to keep slogging away.

Adam Rayner

twilight waiting opportunity

If someone offers you a three picture deal at 20 you'd take it. I would have killed for it.

Adam Rayner

offers deals three

I'm kind of glad that I was able to properly grow up before becoming a massive movie star.

Adam Rayner

growing-up becoming stars

So my character on 'Tyrant' is a chap called Barry Al Fayeed, and he is the second son of a fictional Middle Eastern dictator. But, he has grown up since he was young in America. He's trained as a doctor. He's married a beautiful American girl, had two kids, so he's very much an American.

Adam Rayner

girl beautiful character son

I'm actually half Brit and half American. I have a British father and an American mother, but as far as I'm aware, no Middle Eastern blood.

Adam Rayner

american mother father blood

To be honest, unless you rocket straight to stardom as a gorgeous young vampire, you can spend a lot of time working behind a bar.

Adam Rayner

behind you vampire time

Everyone working on 'Tyrant' wants to present the world and the issues in it in an intelligent, open, fair, non-reductive kind of way. For the actors, we have to try and make these stories as truthful and compelling as possible.

Adam Rayner

everyone try way world

We rarely just hate people or love people. Normally, the people we have moments of the most impassioned hate for, it's because we love them so much.

Adam Rayner

hate moments love people

We shot a bit of 'Hunted' in Tangier, and you are in a very, very different world. It's very difficult to blend in over there.

Adam Rayner

you difficult different world

Obviously, 'Homeland' is not just a spy thriller. It's more than that, but 'Tyrant' will be a bit more of a palace drama. It'll be about the families, but there will be political intrigue as well.

Adam Rayner

more will political drama

I've done shows that aired on American TV, but none of them proved to be successful, so yes, no one here knows who I am.

Adam Rayner

american i-am done successful

Who knows - I would like to think that I'd be a fantastic president, and I'd be extremely levelheaded, and I'd be very fair, and I wouldn't persecute people, and I'd listen to the people that disagreed with me and all the rest of it, but who knows.

Adam Rayner

rest think me people

I was always interested in it when I was younger, but it was when I was at university, getting together with other like-minded theatrically inclined types, that I admitted to myself that I wanted to be an actor.

Adam Rayner

myself always university together

That's the great thing about university: you've got people around you who are taking a risk and trying things out themselves. It gives you the confidence to try and take it to the next step, which was drama school.

Adam Rayner

great you confidence people

My mother is American. I first went to school in America, and we came back when I was about six to rural Norfolk. In primary school, I was teased immediately and mercilessly. I probably dropped that accent within about 10 days.

Adam Rayner

back mother america school

I certainly have a sliver of me, which is definitely American, and feels a great pull towards where I spent time when I was very young, which is in California.

Adam Rayner

american great me time

'Homeland' is a thriller with a lot of cloak and dagger spy stuff, which is one of the things that makes it so much fun.

Adam Rayner

things homeland spy fun