Quote

When I choose a role it's either because I recognise the man, or that I'm very curious to know him. If I neither recognise nor know him, then it is better that I don't play him.

Ben Kingsley

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Ben Kingsley
Age: 80
Born: 1943
Born: December 31
Actor
Character Actor
Film Actor
Stage Actor
Television Actor
Snainton
North Yorkshire
Krishna Pandit Bhanji
Role
Choose
Roles
Either
Better
Play
Recognise
Men
Curious
Neither

More quotes by Ben Kingsley

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I told myself that I would not go back to the camps as an actor ever again, that I was very frightened of wearing a yellow star. It was fear, it was cowardice, I was.
Ben Kingsley
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Sometimes it's right to do the wrong things and right now is one of those times.
Ben Kingsley
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I don't honestly think people know what acting is.
Ben Kingsley
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I was fortunate as a young actor, to go straight to the RSC, where I learned that being an actor can bring with it wonderful responsibilities.
Ben Kingsley
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Working in film, if you work with great directors, you learn that after every take you must let go. Sitting with my wife at the Academy Awards, we both let the moment just go.
Ben Kingsley
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Hamlet is an astonishing intelligence.
Ben Kingsley
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They're a very strange lot actors, very strange people.
Ben Kingsley
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The number of choices you make in the event that you see on stage, those choices are sometimes largely determined by the rehearsal process and the experiments that you go through and the choices that you make in the rehearsal room, not in front of an audience.
Ben Kingsley
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Well, it's wonderful to be identified strongly with my work.
Ben Kingsley
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What is chess, do you think? Those who play for fun or not at all dismiss it as a game. The ones who devote their lives to it for the most part insist that it's a science. It's neither. Bobby Fischer got underneath it like no one before and found at its center, art.
Ben Kingsley
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If I were to play somebody who ran a fish and chip shop, I would not work in a fish and chip shop for three months. Staring at chips is not going to help me in my performance.
Ben Kingsley
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I don't do anything that would ever come across as advice or suggestion, but it's just part of a debate. Like, I would like to try this, or Let me do another one with more stillness, let me emphasize that. Rather than I think you should emphasize this, I think - you know, I don't impose choices.
Ben Kingsley
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We are adjusters. We empathize, we change rhythm and above all we listen to our fellow actors-if they're good actors.
Ben Kingsley
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The biggest surprise in a man's life is old age.
Ben Kingsley
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I think that you can fall into bad habits with comedy... It's a tightrope to stay true to the character, true to the irony, and allow the irony to happen.
Ben Kingsley
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I love storytelling. If you strip all the bits away, what you'll find at the center is a storyteller. As I warm to my career and love it more, I have a sense that storytelling is healing, in many ways. You can reach an audience and heal, and by heal, I mean entertain and provoke. It's a wonderful life.
Ben Kingsley
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In England, it's now Sir Ben. Mister has just disappeared. It's not even on my passport anymore. They've taken Mister away from me.
Ben Kingsley
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I always try to find something I admire about every character I play.
Ben Kingsley
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There's so much crap talked about acting.
Ben Kingsley
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I didn't go to drama school because, from the first refusal I then, as I said, a couple of weeks later, was offered a professional job, where I am immensely grateful to the journey.
Ben Kingsley