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The clear problem of the outlawing of insult is that too many things can be interpreted as such. Criticism, ridicule, sarcasm, merely stating an alternative point of view to the orthodoxy, can be interpreted as insult.

Rowan Atkinson

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Rowan Atkinson
Age: 69
Born: 1955
Born: January 6
Actor
Comedian
Electrical Engineer
Film Actor
Film Producer
Manufacturer
Screenwriter
Stage Actor
Television Actor
Voice Actor
Mr Bean
Rowan Sebastian Atkinson
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Sarcastic
Point
Alternative
Problem
Insult
Outlawing
Many
Alternatives
Stating
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Criticism
Interpreted
Merely
Orthodoxy
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Ridicule

More quotes by Rowan Atkinson

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I'm sure that a French production of this [Maigret series] would be different. For better or worse, who's to say, but probably not very good for 8 o'clock on ITV.
Rowan Atkinson
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Having spent a substantial part of my career parodying religious figures from my own Christian background, I am aghast at the notion that it could, in effect, be made illegal to imply ridicule of a religion or to lampoon religious figures.
Rowan Atkinson
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I suddenly think the job of acting is a difficult one. It's not as flip, irrelevant and shallow a calling as I thought it was in the Eighties.
Rowan Atkinson
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It's the difficulty we had with Mr. Bean, actually, when it went from TV to film. You certainly discover that you need to explain more about a character.
Rowan Atkinson
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The first couple of weeks of filming were quite tricky for me to find my feet with the character [Maigret], which wasn't helped by the story that we were telling.
Rowan Atkinson
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To criticise a person for their race is a manifestly irrational and ridiculous. But to criticise their religion - that is a right. That is a freedom.
Rowan Atkinson
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[Maigret] is more internal. I think if we made more of these I might let him out a bit.
Rowan Atkinson
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It's the demand in many ways of modern television drama - it's very low key and naturalistic, and, generally speaking, the characters that I've played have not been low key and naturalistic.
Rowan Atkinson
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It's not easy to take a sit-com and turn it into a feature.
Rowan Atkinson
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I've no desire to hang around with a bunch of upper-class delinquents, do twenty minutes' work and then spend the rest of the day loafing about in Paris drinking gallons of champagne and having dozens of moist, pink, highly experienced French peasant girls galloping up and down my - hang on.
Rowan Atkinson
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Look, if I'd wanted a lecture on the rights of man, I'd have gone to bed with Martin Luther.
Rowan Atkinson
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Confronting a stadium audience, you can't see the whites of their eyes. It's just an amorphous mass of noise and, of course, you can't see the alleged billions watching at home either, so the degree to which you are intimidated is quite low.
Rowan Atkinson
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The good thing about those original credit card commercials was that they were very filmic, they were like little movies, so it wasn't a big step to think well maybe we could make a big movie using this character, which we eventually did.
Rowan Atkinson
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I can be reasonably funny and light-hearted when I'm in the company of good friends, but I'm not a jokesmith. I tend to be quite serious.
Rowan Atkinson
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I think in many ways Johnny English is a more believable character.
Rowan Atkinson
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The job is interesting, and the task is difficult, but the man [Maigret] is just a decent man doing a very ordinary job.
Rowan Atkinson
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People think because I can make them laugh on the stage, I'll be able to make them laugh in person. That isn't the case at all. I am essentially a rather quiet, dull person who just happens to be a performer.
Rowan Atkinson
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The Maigret stories are all very different in terms of the content and the way that the stories are told. They're not what I would call formulaic.
Rowan Atkinson
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The Scarlet Pimpernel is the most over-rated human being since Judas Iscariot won the A.D.31 'Best Disciple' competition.
Rowan Atkinson
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Certainly in the second film [Maigret's Dead Man], which is quite a more unpleasant and darker story, it's quite different in tone and feel.
Rowan Atkinson