Period Drama Quotes

I love all Daphne du Maurier's stuff. And just enjoying period dramas, really... wanting to do something drastically different from 'Nighty Night', the chance to write very different language.

Setting a movie in an earlier age gives it a mythical quality.

Yeah, I love 'Boardwalk Empire.'

My favourite TV show is... 'Downton Abbey.' The characters are wonderful, and the style is created so beautifully on screen. Everything from the table settings to the linen seem perfect to me. While I'm watching it, I'm in a totally different world.

Without a doubt, the majority of historical period dramas tend to be told from a certain perspective. At least in America, black people have some visibility in period dramas, although it's usually in the form of slaves or servitude.

I always have to get my U.K. fix, and 'Downton Abbey' is definitely that. I absolutely love period dramas, but this one is particularly appealing - following the ins and outs of aristocracy as well as the interaction between the rich and the poor.

The first thing I did on television was a PBS thing where I played a priest. It was a Walt Whitman or Carl Sandburg story - I can't quite remember - but I was a turn-of-the-20th-century priest kind of guy. Never saw it; don't know if I was any good or not.

When I first read the script for 'A Little Chaos,' I just loved reading it, as it is a really lovely, accessible, contemporary period film.

A large part of how an actor works and their process is the stimulation of what's around you, and none more so than in a period piece. This is a modern piece, as much as it is set in a different time, age and myth. If it wasn't relevant, it wouldn't have been made and we wouldn't be putting our energy into it. It's relevant for us today because, in some ways, it throws up a mirror to all of us. As an actor, you get stimulus and you're effected by that, whether it's costumes or funny beards or castles.

The reason I wanted to do 'The First Men in the Moon' was that there is something so challenging in the combination of space travel and the Edwardian period.

As an audience, if you see 1800s or something, it more often seems that the actors are carrying the weight of the time. It always has a Shakespearean tone to it. To me, that always feels very theatrical and very unrelatable.

I would love to do a period film and work with Shyam Benegal.

I like Daniel Craig. I worked with him on 'Sharpe,' one of the very early ones, maybe the second one we did - 'Sharpe's Revenge?' A long, long time ago, and he was good in that then.

What is a week-end? Maggie Smith in Downton Abbey.

'Downton Abbey'. I love all things olden-days, and I'm very interested in somebody brushing my hair out at the end of the night.

None of us had any idea of how successful Downton was going to be. I thought I was signing up for another period drama that had a slightly modern feel. It had a freedom about it because it was coming out of the head of Julian Fellowes. Anything could happen and generally did.

I hate the word educational! I mean, 'Downton Abbey' is educational in that you come away from it knowing so much more about that period than when the show started, but you don't come away thinking it was educational.

Maybe people don't see me as believable playing a person of today. I guess I'm just more realistic in a corset and funny hairstyles.

I love that period, between the '20s and the '60s. I love doing period pieces, and those eras are my favorite period in time, music wise, and the elegance and the way of being.

We tend to do period stuff because it helps make it one step removed from boring everyday reality.

Anyone suffering Downton Abbey withdrawal symptoms will find an instant tonic.

There are so many things I'd like to do. I'd really like to be in a period piece that takes place in old New York or old Hollywood and wear those costumes and that makeup.

I am a huge 'Downton Abbey' fan - huge!

'Meek's Cutoff' by Kelly Reichardt - it's beautifully shot. It's a complex story. The filmmaker gave a very patient and feminine touch to a story that takes place during a period of history that's very masculine, without losing any of the unforgiving harshness of the reality where the characters found themselves in.

I remember reading the script for 'Dangerous Liaisons' and thinking that I could quite happily spend the rest of my life watching this film; the story and the writing were so wonderful.