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This basic thing I always do: 'What happened between the character's birth, and page one of the script?' Anything that's not in the story, I'll fill in the blanks.

Viggo Mortensen

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Viggo Mortensen
Age: 66
Born: 1958
Born: October 20
Actor
Composer
Film Actor
Film Director
Film Producer
Jazz Musician
Manufacturer
Musician
Painter
Photographer
Poet
Singer
Watertown
New York
Viggo Peter Mortensen
Jr
Story
Script
Stories
Fill
Character
Page
Anything
Scripts
Thing
Basic
Always
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Birth
Happened
Blanks

More quotes by Viggo Mortensen

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Joseph Campbell said the privilege of a lifetime is being yourself. That's his feeling. And I guess it's mine too.
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The Road was a movie that has a good reputation, even though it wasn't released very well, but that's a movie I'm very proud of.
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Speaking more than one language and living in a multicultural family and environment did not seem like anything but what it was: the world I lived in.
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In a lot of ways, I envy someone like Omar Sharif who lived in a hotel for decades.
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I prefer the smaller acting than big histrionics. It's about reacting and looks, which is often underestimated.
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In the end, the actor's main power is the power to say, 'No.'
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When I have a day off, I won't spend it at a Hollywood party. I'd rather be at home with paints and a blank canvas.
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You can't really divorce yourself and your life from the world you live in.
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I was born in New York but as a baby moved to Venezuela and Argentina. I've also lived in Denmark, where my father's from. I've traveled a lot, and having that sort of background probably increased the chance that I was going to remain curious as an adult about people who are different.
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Some actors learn the habit of promoting themselves as a brand - by dressing in a certain way, by going out with a certain person - it gives them what they obviously want, which is to keep a level of fame. I'm not putting it down.
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I take my work seriously, but it's not the only thing that exists in the world.
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In a movie, you're raw material, just a hue of some color and the director makes the painting.
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When we shot 'The Lord of the Rings,' we had special permission to film in wild areas of New Zealand that could be accessed only by helicopter. They would drop us off and we would work all day, and they'd pick us up and take us out again.
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Looking at acting, in the movies or the theater, and the way I like to look at it, it’s just an extension of childhood play… Kids play and imagine in a very intense fashion and they don’t need any director telling them “You really have to believe in it.” They believe in it completely.
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Like most people I can be lazy, so it's nice to have a goal or deadline or reason to work out. I feel better when I get to exercise, or when I'm outdoors. I like to hike, swim and run, and I love to play soccer.
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When there is conflict, it's good to step away, even for five minutes, because you could say terrible things that you can't take back, so it's best to walk away.
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I think that people who get to a certain position, and then try to ferociously defend it or build on it, it's kind of a dead-end street. You see people becoming miserable that way.
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The only thing that I always do - is once I've taken on a job, even just to do one scene in a movie, I ask myself, What's happened the moment the kid was born, until page one of the script? To answer that simple question, I have an infinite amount of work to do. And I enjoy that part as much as I enjoy any part of making movies.
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With any character I have played there’s infinite possibilities for how they might behave, depending on who they are talking to or how they react to things.
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I've never been conscious of having any real career plan, and I do not have a wish-list of actors, directors, screenwriters, or cameramen I'm hoping to work with. Life, I feel, has a way of leading us to the right situations and people, or at least to interesting ones.
Viggo Mortensen