I've never done a [Berthold] Brecht. In the 1960s when the Berliner Ensemble came over [to England] with Helene Weigel [Brecht's second wife], I saw all the Berlin actors. It was an amazing time, very exciting early 1960s. John Hurt More Quotes by John Hurt More Quotes From John Hurt We are all racing towards death. No matter how many great, intellectual conclusions we draw during our lives, we know they're all only man-made, like God. I begin to wonder where it all leads. What can you do, except do what you can do as best you know how. John Hurt racing intellectual men If you listen, you learn; if you talk, you don't. John Hurt ifs As Beckett said, it's not enough to die, one has to be forgotten as well. John Hurt enough forgotten said Each day, as you get older, there is a new perspective on life. It's a progression of some sort. John Hurt progression perspective each-day Society is constantly recalibrating, redefining what it considers to be moral and immoral. John Hurt redefining immoral moral I put everything I can into the mulberry of my mind and hope that it is going to ferment and make a decent wine. How that process happens, I'm sorry to tell you I can't describe. John Hurt everything-happens-for-a-reason wine sorry The only concession you can make is to what you believe is right. John Hurt concessions believe In anything really, it's finding the reality. You can't be 'real,' but you can create a reality. And that created reality is what the audience believes in. And that's essential. Because if the audience doesn't believe that, they're never going to trust you. And if they don't trust you, you can't lead them up the mountain. John Hurt mountain real believe I loathed school. I don't have an academic mind, and besides I was so bored by my teachers! How teachers can take a child's inventiveness and say yes, yes, in that pontifical way of theirs, and smother everything! John Hurt teacher children school I think I'd rather do [acting] in the real place. It requires different things, working with green screen, but its an imaginative exercise anyway, the whole business of acting, so it just gives you a bit more to feed the imagination. Unless it's really silly, just two of you stuck in a space with nothing but green screen that's got to be pretty difficult. John Hurt real exercise silly Life is full of ironies and paradoxes. John Hurt irony paradox life-is I never had any ambition to be a star, or whatever it is called, and I'm still embarrassed at the word. John Hurt embarrassed stars ambition Pretending to be other people is my game and that to me is the essence of the whole business of acting. John Hurt business essence games I think it's interesting to see how things come into and go out of fashion. John Hurt fashion interesting thinking Nudes are the greatest to paint. Everything you can find in a landscape or a still life or anything else is there: darkness and light, character dimension, texture. I painted heads too, of course. John Hurt light darkness character I think you can fan the flames, but I think in the same way that a mathematician is a mathematician - He's not taught to be a mathematician. He either has a feeling for equations and an understanding and delight in it, not only in the purity of it, but in its beauty as well. John Hurt flames feelings thinking I am really the victim of other people's imagination. John Hurt victim imagination people I think, you have to forget about intellect, to a degree. Intuition is very important when you're working with a lens, I believe, for what the lens is doing, too. John Hurt intuition believe thinking Acting is an imaginative leap, really. And imaginations prosper in different circumstances. And it's being able - I can't tell you how one does, but one tries to read those circumstances correctly. John Hurt acting imagination trying Obviously, the arrogance of my own nature in regards to other people's work would suggest that I think I'm talented. John Hurt arrogance people thinking
