Cillian Murphy Quotes

For me, drama is conflict.

I don't have a burning passion to live in America per se but I would certainly like to work there.

Two weeks ago we couldn't pronounce your name, but you were in the lead in a film that made millions, so we're sending you all these scripts.

And, for any performer, to be able to go deep into character is fantastic. In film you only get to do that if you're the leading character. But in television you get 18 hours to really test the audience and take them to the edge of how far they will go with this character. I can step over this line and I love that.

I'm definitely a frustrated musician, though it's more in terms of wishing I was a better guitar player and songwriter. But I've never regretted becoming an actor instead. I think it's been a more pure form of self-expression for me. I luckily found something that I could aspire to be good at, whereas I never... I think I'd never quite reach that level of artist that I enjoy in the music world.

I think if you play characters, it's very important not to ever tag them with any sort of disorder, or diagnose them, or whatever. You have to normalize the behavior to get inside the character.

All I've tried to do as an actor is follow the good writing. That's been my main drive. It's not always possible, so when you do come upon it, like when I came upon this, you realize pretty quickly this is something you need to be involved with.

Actors' careers are random with a capital "R."

I personally think if something's not a challenge there's no point doing it because you're not gonna learn much.

We were able to shoot in a lot of the locations where the mission actually happened and these guys existed, so that was kind of very affecting. We had a Czech crew and a lot of Czech actors. There's a great deal of authenticity to the project [Anthropoid], and Sean [Ellis] was very anxious that that was the case from the beginning.

Then, at age 20, I discovered theater sort of by accident. Quite quickly, theater became more important to me than music. I began to realize that maybe my talents as a musician were quite limited, or had a ceiling to them, whereas acting seemed to sort of stretch before me. I got very passionate about it very quickly.

I suppose I've always been attracted to this sort of outsider in general - in literature, in music, politics, whatever - and to the person that is able to be relentlessly themselves. I don't think that I have that quality, that strength of mind.

I think for me with theater, I need to take a break and then fall in love with it again. And then go do it again.

I think it's necessary to keep moving forward. I've always said that nostalgia is death, really for anyone creative.

My only two constants are to challenge myself and to try not to repeat myself.

For me it's always been about the stories, not what medium. The medium is secondary to the stories.

You need to be as clean of a slate as you can be, as an actor. You have to try to be open to every experience.

I loved The Fall; I was kind of obsessed with that show.

I don't care if people perceive me as always selling out because I'm doing a studio picture. For me, the whole thing is you should be diverse in your choices; that's the beauty of being an actor, you should be able to do that.

I think any actor that says 'I never watch my films' is a liar because you have to watch it at least once and also you're going to watch it when you're doing your ADR.

It's a very organic kind of way that people are discovering it, by word of mouth, which I always think is the best way for things to grow. In terms of the affect it's been having on me, I don't even notice that. It's lovely to be able to talk about a piece of work that you're very proud of, that I think's a complex piece of work and not superficial and has depth to it.

I started off in theater; I did exclusively theater for four or five years. In the last few years, television has come along but I can still make film. I feel very privileged that I can move between them.

You know, I'm a skinny Irish guy.

There's always a level where you think you can improve and do better. Certainly at the beginning... I did four years of straight theater without ever having a part in a movie, and I remember being far more nervous on a film set than I was on the stage. It took a while for that to become less so.

I like the little bit of distance that London affords me and I like living in a world capital. I like having the culture at my fingertips.

You do your due diligence, you read as much as you can, and then, ultimately, I find that you discard that and you concentrate on the characters [of 'Antropoid'] and you can draw on [the research] if you wish, but I think ultimately it's about bringing as much truth and honesty to the portrayal as possible.

I take my hat off to the ladies. The amount of grooming-plucking and shaving and all the other things men never have to do. I went down and spent time with transvestites in London in the clubs and all that. Got an insight to that world, and it's a mad world, but they are very warm and very open people. It was a great experience.

I'm not interested in a good man's life. I'm interested in contradiction.

I feel very lucky to be making good work still. The confidence of youth, or that sort of competitiveness you get when you're 22 or 23, the impatience - that's probably been tempered. Hopefully I'm slightly better company.

If you behave like a celebrity, then people will treat you like a celebrity, and if you don't, they won't. There's not much to write about me in the tabloids.

I try not to think retrospectively. It's important, as an artist, to look forward, always. I do try to take work that involves some challenge. If you approach a piece of work and you're going, "Yeah, yeah, I can do that," then that's kind of a red flag.

I'm interested in pressure, I'm interested in duress. All the great works of art, or film or literature, in my opinion, have elements of those in them.

I like watching film, I go to the cinema, but a lot of times I go to see kids' films.

I really feel actors should try and do as much diverse work as possible to try and keep it interesting.

I always think it's a sign of a truly gifted director when they can move seamlessly between genres.