In any given project, there are a few moments where there is the usual disappointment, as it were, when you look in the mirror, and you realize you're not 23 and looking like Brad Pitt.
— Kenneth Branagh
I loved 'Kundun.'
Shakespeare is rhythmic; he is musical in the sense that he likes poetry, and he's musical because he constantly refers to settings where there's singing and dancing.
Variety is very, very good. Going from medium to medium, if you get the chance to do it, from theater to television to film, which are all distinctly different, keeps me sharp.
I don't know that the Brits have the monopoly on being organized, but they do have a way of working with which I'm familiar. It's not necessarily the best way, but it's a way.
One of the problems with Shakespeare is that you can never give him a ring.
Life is about making plans from which you deviate, almost always. If you are lucky, you do come up with a plan.
'Thor' has got several big battles in it, a reckless, headstrong young hero who has to confront his past and deal with a complicated relationship with his father, it has lots of savage Europeans hacking each other to death at various points, and all of this sounded very much like 'Henry V.'
To look out of a car in Scania, you see a painting on the horizontal - one windmill, one tiny farmhouse, acres of beet or grass.
I suppose that was my first bit of acting, the acquisition of an English accent. It was really just an attempt to be understood.
A lot of the films I've done have links to other movies that I've directed in the past.
The Chinese say, 'It's good to live in interesting times.'
'Frankenstein' feels like an ancient tale, the kind of traditional story that appears in many other forms.
What I've found about 'Cinderella' is that what it provokes in an audience is really extraordinary. It appears to be a deceptively simple tale, but I've heard nothing but people drawing all different things out of it.
I think we love the escapism of something like 'Cinderella,' and I think we do with 'Thor.'
It's funny to be in rooms where you were originally referred to as 'The Shakespeare Guy' and to suddenly be in the position where you're 'The Blockbuster Guy.' That's a pretty unusual turnabout, I must say.
I come from the theatre; my bones are in the theatre. It's as natural as breathing to want to be in the theatre.
For what it's worth, I enjoy 'Dexter,' 'Modern Family,' 'True Blood' and 'Breaking Bad.' I've enjoyed the wonderful 'The Pacific.'
My experience of great storytelling, working with classics, is just finding a way to present it simply but let the story do its own work, or be an invite to the audience's imagination.
I did 'Love's Labour's Lost' in the theater and found it to be riotously funny.
What you want is the opportunity to work and an audience. Prizes after that are just a great big bonus.
When you cast someone like Natalie Portman, the character can't just be the love interest.
Certainly, I'm excited by epic subjects. It doesn't particularly frighten me.
I've lived a lot of my life in London, so I often feel that I am a Londoner.
There's always something to think about in terms of problems that are dark and important and immediate and scary.
I am very much looking forward to new adventures - including, I hope, Broadway - sooner rather than later.
I went to Moscow and met some slightly powerful and scary people.
In the case of 'Jack Ryan,' it was a huge collaboration, and I enjoyed it very much, and most of all, I want the audience to enjoy it, too. I want them to feel immersed in this world.
I've always loved pure, silly slapstick comedy. It always makes me laugh.
I went to a comprehensive school and didn't go to university.
I'm a devotee of Stephen Sondheim. I think he's a genius.
I think that Shakespeare himself raided fairy tales and chronicle writers, and he always looked to people who worked in the mythic genres, whether it was folk tales or popular novels.
I live in the English countryside, so I'm surrounded by magpies.
A creative and artistic home is what I've been looking for in the theatre.
At the end of every stage performance, the audience all applaud me for doing my job, but I have friends who work in offices who don't get that.
The director needs to be in command on set because everything crumbles if that's not the case.
'Jack Ryan' is a very fast-paced, very contemporary, very action-driven thriller.
I think I do have a way of predicting - not always accurately - what is a nerve-wracking day for actors, what may be a difficult scene or a difficult moment, how small - and it may be down to one line - a thing maybe that is upsetting or undermining a performance.
Even in the case of a god, audiences - paradoxically - enjoy recognizing the human traits.
You go to the airport and look at the bookstand, and you feel the titles are similar, the covers are similar, and you wonder how they can be different.
I think television goes through phases, like other creative arts, where suddenly a group of people are producing exciting work all at once.
I read the final Wallander novel, 'The Troubled Man,' not long after it was published.
I think that music is crucially important in Shakespeare - and, clearly, was an important part of the Elizabethan theatre. And, it's always been something that was a profound element of the experience of Shakespeare that I have been drawn to - and interpreters have, as well.
I love thrillers, and I always have.
I suppose, at 50, you value things in a different way. So you value connections, you value your friendships, you value your health, and you are much more aware of time passing.
In the course of my lifetime, that world went from violence to a kind of peace.
I'm just a normal working class boy from Belfast.
Shakespeare's always on my dance card if it can be.
Many of us live in dysfunctional families, and so even if it's in a fairy tale, or perhaps because it's in a fairy tale, we have a chance to look at that side of our reflected lives differently.
I'm interested in creating new work.
