53 Quotes by Brendan Gleeson

I don’t plan in terms of career ambitions. The only career ambition I have is to work with people who are going to bring you up and elevate your performance. They’ll let you know things that you didn’t know already and bring you places that you might not have gotten to otherwise.

I think most people are decent people. I don’t know if they could stand the pressure he’s under, but most people aspire to be decent people.

I think it’s doubly important, now that we see so many people failing. When the norm is an anti-hero, there’s a serious loss when you cannot portray a decent person on screen without it becoming slightly sentimental or feeling like it’s unrealistic.

It’s interesting going between small parts and then bigger roles where you carry the film. If the writing is good, and if the people involved have integrity, then you’ll do it, even if it’s only five minutes on screen.

I started hitching about the country when I was 16 or 17 years old. I found the music that was played around the country – Irish music – had a particular resonance.

I’m aware now over the last 5 or 10 years that when you do an accent, you really have to kind of get down to the nitty gritty and go into the phonetics of it, if necessary. Find out not just the sounds but the rhythms and the music – or lack thereof – in a particular accent.

I think every character actor at some stage likes to carry a film. It can be extremely liberating to just come in for a scene or two and do your thing. But I find it frustrating if I’m just doing little bits here and there for too long.

Once we start shooting, it’s in there. You’re trying to get into a place where you rise to the work, rather than make it manageable or make it work for you.