Happy Birthday

Happy Birthday Sean Connery – 1930 – 2020 

festreviews Happy Birthday

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I’m an actor – it’s not brain surgery. If I do my job right, people won’t ask for their money back.

I have always hated that damn James Bond. I’d like to kill him.

I’ve never kept a record of anything. I gave away everything: all the posters, the memorabilia that would have been helpful – and financially rewarding.

[on whether he would ever escape being identified as James Bond] It’s with me ’til I go in the box.

I care about Bond and what happens to him. You cannot be connected with a character for this long and not have an interest. All the Bond films had their good points.

Turning 67 Today: Tim Burton

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[suburbia] “I think the atmosphere that I grew up in, yes, there was a subtext of normalcy. I don’t even know what the word means, but it’s stuck in my brain. It’s weird. I don’t know if it’s specifically American, or American in the time I grew up, but there’s a very strong sense of categorization and conformity. I remember being forced to go to Sunday school for a number of years, even though my parents were not religious. No one was really religious; it was just the framework. There was no passion for it. No passion for anything. Just a quiet, kind of floaty, kind of semi-oppressive, blank palette that you’re living in.”

[the approach you have to take in movies] ” . . . you always have to feel like it’s gonna be the greatest, even if it’s a . . . you know . . . piece of crap.”

[Talking about the Batman characters]: “These are some of the wildest characters in comics and yet, they seem the most real to me.”

[About working with Jack Nicholson on Batman (1989)] “By the time Jack walks onto the set, he feels very clear and strong about the character. So when you’re shooting it’s great, because that’s when you toy around with the levels of how broad to go.”

Turning 42 Today: Caitlin FitzGerald

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Caitlin Fitzgerald at arrivals for THE FIXER Premiere at 2016 Tribeca Film Festival, The School of Visual Arts (SVA) Theatre, New York, NY April 16, 2016. Photo By: Steven Ferdman

You never stop thinking about technique, but really, the reason we’re actors is because of the sheer joy of those few moments you get every now and again where you’re totally present. The rest is just struggle and misery.

I’m kind of a control freak. I like to be really prepared.

The notion of overnight stardom is really dangerous. For almost every person who has success in this business, there are years and years of hard work to get there. To have longevity, you really have to train, and you really have to work.

In a play, you know where you start and end and all the stops you have to do, but in television, you can’t construct this carefully planned out arc for your character. You often get a script and you’re shooting it two days later, and you don’t know what’s going to happen next. It’s one of the harder things that I’ve done.

Turning 52 Today: Dave Chappelle

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You can become famous but you can’t become unfamous. You can become infamous but not unfamous.

I don’t normally talk about my religion publicly because I don’t want people to associate me and my flaws with this beautiful thing. And I believe it is beautiful if you learn it the right way.

[on living in Ohio] Turns out you don’t need $50 million to live around these parts, just a nice smile and a kind way about you. You guys are the best neighbors ever… That’s why I came back and that’s why I’m staying.

Turning 44 Today: Chad Michael Murray

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My ideal girl is someone who’s smart and pretty in an innocent way, and someone who listens and cares.

Writing inspires me. I couldn’t live without my journal.

The rumors – that’s the thing I hate. People assume way too much, and I can’t stand it. I know the truth; I don’t feel like I have to defend myself. I’m a pretty good guy. Yeah, I like to go out with my boys and have a good time – I’m 23 years old! But the next thing you know, there are 20 stories about me. It’s inappropriate on so many levels. I don’t know if it will ever stop. All I need to know is, I have faith in myself and I know what’s really going on.

I hated high school. I didn’t have any friends because I didn’t fit in, but I enjoyed the educational part of it. My teachers allowed me to be creative, so I thought past high school to what I wanted to do.

Turning 35 Today: Elizabeth Debicki 

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If I’ve missed out on a part because I’m tall, that’s not the excuse my agent is going to use, whether or not that’s happened in the past. There’s nothing I can do about that. You are the way you are, and you have to embrace that and love that about yourself.

[on her audition for Widows (2018)] I put myself on tape while I was in Australia in my friend’s garage, ’cause I am all about the glamour. I remember putting a lot of eyeliner on, and picking out some hoops. A few days later, I flew over to L.A. and read for Steve McQueen in person. I was completely terrified. Good terror, though.

I think it’s only in hindsight that you understand what was a turning point. If you actually felt the penny drop, you should probably check yourself, like, “Whoa, you’re doing OK, but you’re not that great.” It’s an interesting schism between knowing quietly inside yourself that you’re worth being heard, but challenging yourself so you don’t plateau. I look back at certain moments that empowered me and it’s always about the people I worked with.

Turning 65 Today: Jared Harris 

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There were a few times where I could have worked with my father (Richard Harris) at the beginning. One of them was in The Field (1990)– they couldn’t find someone to play the son and they offered the part to me. But my father and I didn’t think it was a good idea and looking back I think we made the right decision.

I’ve auditioned for normal characters. But I never get cast.

[on Daniel Day-Lewis‘ work ethic] His attention to detail and commitment is truly impressive, but people refer to it as being an imposition or intimidating. It isn’t. Actors do that stuff all the time. He just likes to “stay in it”, and he asks that you respect that, by not talking about bullshit.

Turning 45 Today: Joanne Froggatt

festreviews Happy Birthday

In true-life dramas, you have to do so much research. It’s a big responsibility to make sure things are as correct as possible. In ‘Robin Hood’, you have more artistic license – it’s all action, adventure and reaction. This gives everyone a chance to make their characters their own and to make them believable.

I really enjoy dressing up. I’m pretty much a girlie girl.

I grew up on a farm – it was a lovely life; we’d make tree houses all day – and my parents worked from home.

Turning 62 Today: Park Chan-Wook

festreviews Happy Birthday

Basically, I’m throwing out the question ‘When is such violence justified?’ To get that question to touch the audience physically and directly – that’s what my goal is. In the experience of watching my film, I don’t want the viewer to stop at the mental or the intellectual. I want them to feel my work physically. And because that is one of my goals, the title ‘exploitative’ will probably follow me around for a while.

In our lives, we have good things and bad things, happiness and pain. Life is full of pain and happiness and that’s what I wanted to show.

Living without hate for people is almost impossible. There is nothing wrong with fantasizing about revenge. You can have that feeling. You just shouldn’t act on it.

I have principles and rules. I deal very carefully with acts of violence and make sure that audiences understand how much suffering these acts cause.

Happy Birthday River Phoenix (1970-1993) 

festreviews Happy Birthday

“I feel that there are great minds up there who would like to see what I can do with an Oscar nomination. I guess many people would change after a nomination in the way they see things. In my case it’s really irrelevant in terms of what I do. Still, it was an incredible experience which I will put in my memories, like everything else.” (On his Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actor for Running on Empty (1988) in 1989.)

If I have some celebrity, I hope I can use it to make a difference. The true social reward is that I can speak my mind and share my thoughts about the enviroment and civilisation itself. There’s so much shit happening with people who are exploiting their positions and creating a lot of negativity.

Every day of my life since I finished My Own Private Idaho (1991), at some point in the day, I find the conversation somehow goes back to that film, because it was just such a great experience. I just start getting all joyous and start babbling about it. [on his feelings about My Own Private Idaho (1991) just after the film’s release in 1991]

I would just look at Harrison [Harrison Ford]; he would do stuff and I would not mimic it, but interpret it younger. Mimicking is a terrible mistake that many people make when they play someone younger, or with an age difference. Mimicking doesn’t interpret true because you can’t just edit it around. [on his interpretation of a young Indiana Jones in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989)]