197 Quotes by Kenneth Branagh

I feel more Irish than English. I feel freer than British, more visceral, with a love of language. Shot through with fire in some way. That's why I resist being appropriated as the current repository of Shakespeare on the planet. That would mean I'm part of the English cultural elite, and I am utterly ill-fitted to be.

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.

With people in corsets you need, an hour and a half in you have to give somebody something, you have to have those trays with a little bit of fruit going around or something because you get that blood sugar [dropping] thing, so it's curious because that's in your mind at the same time as you're about to say, 'I think it's about the humanity and the depth of feeling and we need to feel [Cinderella] soul expand and by the way, more cheese for the people in the back.'

I think the best actors are the most generous, the kindest, the greatest people and at their worst they are vain, greedy and insecure.

Even if people are all from the same place, there can be very, very different approaches. It's one of the things I'm fascinated by. It's why I like directing. I like to see how different people approach trying to be truthful, on camera or in the theater, and whether you can make them match up.

Frankenstein feels like an ancient tale, the kind of traditional story that appears in many other forms. It appeals to something very primal, but it's also about profound things, the very nature of life and death and birth - about, essentially, a man who is resisting the most irresistible fact of all, that we will be shuffling off this mortal coil.

In the hands of a great poet, words have ways of affecting us in ways we don't understand.

I'm just a foul-mouthed Brit.

A brother who is unhappy is a dangerous relative to have.