Tom Hiddleston Quotes

I'm not from that world where you get on your feet and somebody gives you a suggestion and you improv your way through things.

When I rehearse, it ends up doing more harm than good. I think I work a little bit better when it's right off the bat. Mostly, I try to wrap my head around a role as much as I can without rehearsing and then kind of make it as fresh as possible on the day.

Once I'm on set, the only thing I'm really interested in is being in the room. Being present. And trusting that what I've done is sufficient, and I'm also trusting that I've also left room for magic.

I research every part thoroughly. I talk it out with my actor friends, but then I throw it all away when I get to the set. You have to be spontaneous.

Acting has always been instinctive to me.

That's the thing about acting is that it's reacting to what's going on around you.

One of the joys about acting is researching.

I've always believed acting is an improvisational art form, even when not a single line is changed. I mean, the behavior should always be improvised. My favorite moments in any performance are when I'm just along for the ride; when I'm surprising myself. I know when I'm done and I think to myself, 'Gee, I didn't see that coming,' I've done well.

I don't like improv at all. It terrifies me. I like to know exactly what I'm going to say. Being surprised does make me a better actor. Anytime I'm afraid of something that makes me rise to the occasion, it scares me, but it's what makes great actors - being in the moment.

I am an actor and I live in the world of pretend in my working capacity. I live in the world of my imagination.

I think people who are regarded as better actors must have better instincts because, at the end of the day, once they say 'action,' it's you who has to do it right. You can do all the research and preparation or none at all, but it's your instincts that tell you, 'No, I'll do it like this.'

Being an actor is an extension of telling a story and I loved story telling as a child.

In college, I went to school for acting; we had to learn phonetics just to be able to do dialects and all that stuff. I'm somebody who does better just hearing it. I'll just imitate it, and I get it better that way. When I know too much information, I'm not great.

Boxing is a lot of preparation and then improvising, so there are parallels to being an actor.

In a way, as an actor, you do all the preparation and then you want to forget it and just play the scene. As a director, you can't forget it because somebody will remind you that you forgot something. But you can know your plan well enough that you still have a certain amount of freedom.

I don't like a lot of rehearsing.

That's what sets apart one actor from another, and that you can't teach. You can't give someone that. When you're working, putting a character together, or in a scene, that's where things will happen that you have to have the intuition to notice them, and to register them.

I didn't ever think about being an actor. But I fell in love with it when I realized how amazing, difficult, and interesting it is.

Acting to me is always reacting.

I love to be in the position of not knowing what I'm gonna do, but having rehearsed all of those so when something happens with the others actors I go with whatever that is I'm getting.

I love to act and put on a show, but you're playing a character all the time. For music, it's really just me being myself.

Acting is in your soul.

When I started acting, it was really the way for me to be able to communicate.

Writing and directing might be a red herring, and really I'm just re-examining what it is to act, to do it well and do it properly.

There is something about acting that's mysterious and magical because there is only so much I can do to prepare, and then I have to just let go and breathe and believe that it will come through.