Michael Sheen
Michael Sheen
Michael Sheen, OBE is a Welsh actor. After training at London's Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, he worked mainly in theatre throughout the 1990s and made notable stage appearances in Romeo and Juliet, Don't Fool With Love, Peer Gynt, The Seagull, The Homecoming, and Henry V. His performances in Amadeus at the Old Vic and Look Back in Anger at the National Theatre were nominated for Olivier Awards in 1998 and 1999, respectively. In 2003, he was nominated for a...
NationalityWelsh
ProfessionMovie Actor
Date of Birth5 February 1969
CityNewport, Wales
There are times in my career where I can see it would be helped by having a bit more of a profile, but it's not like I refuse to do interviews, no, not at all.
I think it's quite tough for people like Tom Cruise where you can never really get away from being Tom Cruise in something. You're so familiar to people and people know so much about your life.
If someone has an ability to impress an audience there's a tendency to be tempted into doing just that.
Normal people - i.e., people who aren't actors - are the most bizarre people you can ever come across. I'll talk to someone and come away thinking, 'They are clinically insane.'
I think being a parent is the most challenging thing you do. That's why we're here. It's at the heart of what it is to be a human being. It's the ultimate experience because it questions everything about who you are. But it's difficult.
In some ways any film that you do has an artificiality about it. Even when you're doing the most kitchen-sinky, gritty, realistic scene you've still got 50 people standing around watching you with cameras and lights and things.
My rule of thumb is that I want to do things I'd like to go and see myself.
I find increasingly that the more extreme are the things going on in your life, the more cultural reference points fail you. More mythical reference points actually help, and you realise that's what myths are for. It's for human beings to process their experience in extremis.
I suppose I'm something of an eccentric dresser.
I'm not a Tony Blair impersonator.
When I'm in America, I like to be near the sea, listen to music, watch films, read and write.