Kenneth Branagh
Kenneth Branagh
Sir Kenneth Charles Branagh is a Northern Irish actor, director, producer, and screenwriter. Branagh trained at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in London. He has directed or starred in several film adaptations of William Shakespeare's plays, including Henry V, Much Ado About Nothing, Othello, Hamlet, Love's Labour's Lost, and As You Like It...
NationalityIrish
ProfessionDirector
Date of Birth10 December 1960
CityBelfast, Northern Ireland
CountryIreland
I choose to be inspired by things that have been done well in the past. So, I don't worry about being compared, because I think that does paralyze you.
The BAFTA is both absolutely fantastic and sort of meaningless at the same time.
I think people half know it but don't know it, you know? I think when you see the whole thing, there's just such a slew of new things there. You see them in a different light.
This is a very exciting departure for me as a filmmaker,
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 watched a lot of musicals growing up.
Friendship is one of the most tangible things in a world which offers fewer and fewer supports.
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.
It doesn't mean old or younger. I've learned a lot from people much younger than me as well as people much older than me. So I think it's about honesty and generosity.
As soon as someone I don’t respect tells me I can’t do something, it just makes me want to do it even more.
I come from the theatre, my bones are in the theatre; it’s as natural as breathing to want to be in the theatre
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.
The elasticity of Shakespeare is extraordinary.
After Frankenstein, I feel as if I want to make a film about somebody having a nice cup of tea.