I think it helps to have a good old-fashioned trajectory, plodding along. Obviously one has an ego and it's really easy to have that ego tickled, but what helps me get through the night is if I concentrate on just quality of work so that I don't panic about my profile.
Anne-Marie DuffYou can't worry too much about profile; otherwise, you become a different kind of actor, and that's not the kind of actor I want to be.
Anne-Marie DuffThat's the trouble with the suburbs: it's not a city, so you're not anonymous, and it's not a small town, so that people really care about you, but everybody kind of knows each other's business, so you're very judged.
Anne-Marie DuffIn theatre, there's the director, the writer, and below them the actor. In film, it's the actors who are most important. That goes against the grain for me.
Anne-Marie DuffI sometimes think it's like a weird elastic band. The more tragic your work is, the quicker you snap back. There's a catharsis in telling a miserable old tale; you get rid of demons.
Anne-Marie DuffThat's the thing - you do a job like 'Shameless,' and suddenly that's why you can get a job like 'The Virgin Queen', not because of all the classical theatre you've done. But we can be very snippy about television. It's absolutely the most potent and powerful form of storytelling we have.
Anne-Marie Duff