Actors are the best and the worst of people. They're like kids. When they're good, they're very very good. When they're bad they're very very naughty.
Friendship is one of the most tangible things in a world which offers fewer and fewer supports.
I certainly have been guilty of trying to sweep things under the carpet.
I did not make this a long film for its own sake. I wanted to make an entertaining film and offer it out there for those who want to see it. If word of mouth suggests there is an audience out there, hopefully their cinema will show it.
I do think that, for instance, we've been very lucky to have theatrical careers and be associated with Shakespeare which sometimes gives you a kind of bogus kudos.
I don't know that there is too far, actually. I think there's only too bad. If it's bad you've gone too far.
I don't think Hamlet is mad, nor is he predisposed to be a gloomy or tragic figure.
I like to cast actors I admire, one's that are talented. Each one will bring something new to the part. This play has been done thousands of times and now certain characters are too familiar.
I made a bargain with myself. If I hadn't done it by 35, I'd walk away. Hamlet is at a crisis at this point in his life. This is a young man's play.
I only really cast people who are desperate to be in it - who were dying to be in it, whose talent I believed in and were dead ready to do the work that was necessary.
I think A Midsummer Night's Dream would be terrific because of the transformations that occur. Or The Tempest, things like that. Extraordinary larger than life or supernatural element.
I think the best actors are the most generous, the kindest, the greatest people and at their worst they are vain, greedy and insecure.
I watched a lot of musicals growing up.
If it's good art, it's good.
If you've done a brilliant version it becomes something else.
In the hands of a great poet, words have ways of affecting us in ways we don't understand.
It's quite hard for people to just accept that they're very contradictory.
It's very strange that the people you love are often the people you're most cruel to.
Music and language are a vital element. We, as actors and directors, offer it to people who want to experience it. Sometimes the actual meaning is less important than the words themselves.
My definition of success is control.
One of the things that makes Hamlet unique among Shakespeare's characters is his courage to face up to the darker elements of his personality.
So many plays with magic in them that would be a terrific invitation to an imaginative animation team.
The best actors, I think, have a childlike quality. They have a sort of an ability to lose themselves. There's still some silliness.
The elasticity of Shakespeare is extraordinary.
The glory of 70mm is the sharpness of the image it offers.
The long version of the play is actually an easier version to follow. In all of the cut versions the intense speeches are cut too close together for the audience and the actors.
The radicalism that they applied, which kept it very lively and in the popular imagination and in fact gave us Shakespeare were way more brutal with a playwright who continues to be bouncing back from all of that.
There is some mysterious thing that goes on whereby, in the process of playing Shakespeare continuously, actors are surprised by the way the language actually acts on them.
We're self obsessed and mad and stupid - not that other people can't be the same way - but the extremes are kind of honest in some mad way. Anyway, I like them.
In 2002, Kenneth appeared in the world wide smash hit, 'Harry Potter and The Chamber of Secrets' as Gilderoy Lockhart. In 2004, ex wife Emma Thompson appeared in next film in the series, 'Harrry Potter and the Prisioner of Azkaban.'
Kenneth directed 'The Play What I Wrote,' a homage to cult British comedians Morcombe and Wise. The play was performed in London and New York.
Kenneth studied 'A Level' English, History and Sociology.
In 2003, Kenneth was nominated for a BAFTA twice in the category of Best Actor for 'Conspiracy' and 'Shackleton.'
When Kenneth's first wife Emma Thompson was awarded an Oscar in 1992, he was not able to attend the ceremony as he was contracted to play Hamlet for the Royal Shakespeare Company in Stratford-upon-Avon
In his biography 'Beginning', Kenneth admits that he claimed to be an excellent horse rider in order to get a part in the Australian film 'Boy in the Bush.' In truth, he was terrified of horses.
Kenneth was offered a place at the Central School of Speech and Drama.
In 1993, Kenneth received the Michael Balcon Award from BAFTA for his outstanding contribution to television and film.
Kenneth won a Golden Osella at the Venice Film Festival in 1995 in the category of Best Director for the film 'In The Bleak Midwinter.'
In 1990, Kenneth won a Best Direction BAFTA award for the film 'Henry The Fifth.'
In 2001, Kenneth won an Emmy in the category of Outstanding Lead Actor in a Mini Series or Movie for his portrayal of Reinhard Heydrich in 'Conspiracy.'
Kenneth has been nominated for four Ocars: In 1997 in the category of Best Writing, Screenplay based on Another Medium for 'Hamlet,' in 1993 for Best Short Live Action Film for 'Swan Song,' and twice for his 1989 film adaptaion of 'Henry the Fifth' in the categories of Best Actor and Best Director.
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