Delightful Colin Firth on His Acting/If He Makes a Prediction, Go The Other Way LOL

[Applause] ya know tell me about it it's great actually there's a I need to process it a little bit this I have to say is first thing of its nature I'm not someone who's used to tributes you know so you know having a moment when it's sort of everything you know all I've ever done really is is read the stage directions and the lines and done them you know so on the one hand it's a little bit bewildering when so many people seem to get it when I'm so used to being bewildered by the fact that nobody seems to get in and then you get used to that and then suddenly people seem to get it so all it's really done is to serve an ongoing state of confusion well as far as I'm concerned that's that is the noise has been the job description I don't know what else actors are supposed to do we don't write the staff you know the writers do that writers are a little bit like God to us I mean they they set the world in motion you know the thing where we're going to inhabit they they declare what it's going to be they create the characters they you know they're the ones who say let there be light and you are you will be this person this is your fate you will either live or die and we will decide all that for you we don't make those decisions all we can do is inhabit those things that happen in between the words so the writings already done and what we do is pick up I suppose where the the words leave off you know we we provide the gestures the nuances the you know the subtext and all those little reflexes that happen you know that actually language itself can't address I met years ago I was a student I had had a girlfriend who was deeply distrustful of mainly of two things one was of words she said words don't express adequately anything and the other was of acting which pretty well wrote me off you know but I remember thinking if you put those two things together there was something that made sense of my rather you know my rather dubious craft which is you know can be seen as just aping behavior and I suppose just a you know in a kind of self-serving attention-getting kind of mechanism and I just thought well actually maybe the inadequacy of words is somehow enriched by the performing of them and this is something that goes back for millennia it's not just it's not just even in conventional theatre you know if you if you read 19th century literature 18th century literature you'll find that one of the that the rituals of the literary classes was to read aloud to each other correct that it was the performed word with it was something that was actually celebrated even in a domestic environment and I think that that's something which you know like I don't if we've lost it but I certainly think it's something that you know maybe special pleading for my profession well I think if something could be celebrated well I think it's probably one of those sort of rather magical things that happens as a result of my complete and utter failure to make the right choice I think to be offered something by a fashion designer who only has 21 days to make a film and I did it it's the difference between your instinct and mine just listen I just wanted to warm to my team for a second because you know quite frankly if I'm a very very useful person to have around whenever there's a horse race or an election or a football game check in with me for a prediction and then go the other way and you'll make a fortune and that's that's defined my life and my career and most things really and and maybe this is just one of those moments when you know my blind instinct for making the wrong choice just suddenly worked in my favor I I found Tom compelling I found him not to be out of the usual catalogue in fact I suppose what added up to a decision not to a decision to do this was all the improbabilities together he surprised me in every way I didn't expect him to make a film he turned out he wanted to make a film I didn't expect him to make film on this subject you know her fashion design was gonna make a film you think well maybe he'd make a film by Studio 54 or maybe he's gonna make a film about you know the fashion world in Milan or something but you don't expect it to be about a lonely suicidal college professor 962 based on Christopher Isherwood etc etc and then then the other really critical factor was that he chose me and I have to say you know it my vanity was so deeply touched didn't sign on for that at all you know if I'm honest part of me just thought I'm gonna get Tom Ford's gonna make a movie I'm I'm gonna be 50 soon I'm gonna get to look good maybe for the last time I'm gonna get to wear great clothes I was I was probably hoping that it would be a wonderful kind of fashion fest and I would get I would get to be look very cool and I showed up on the set and he made me do all this acting and it was it's just I just thought this not what it said on the tin now you know may think I'm being arched but it's partly it was like Jesus Christ he's working us here and and he doesn't seem to care that much about how we look didn't make me lose weight no this has gone into mythology a little bit because I told a story and then he told a story and no I mean you know he may have had the slight feeling maybe that I was fat I don't know I'm afraid I'm not gonna be able to give you a very detailed or informed answer I you know I there was a chair and a camera pointing at it and I sat in it and they searched the camera on and I did the dialogue and that's all I can tell you a part of the fact he didn't he never said cut I mean all right I'll fill you in a little bit more on the circumstances around my around that day it was election day whatever that was and November was it yeah and that scene was taking was being shot around the time when the result came in in California it's 10 or 9 or 10 o'clock or something Proposition 8 well that there were two results came in one was the Barack had won the election and one was the prop 8 had passed and they would you know I probably wouldn't have known that much about prop 8 had I not been in California and also had I not been doing a film that was to do with a gay character in California etc and so there were these two completely conflicting things one was you know whatever whatever America's sort of current opinion of the president's performances right now it was a remarkable moment for the entire world to see you know [Applause] I spoke to my seven-year-old the next morning and he said he was asking me questions about him he'd stayed up late to watch stuff and he said he's won the election will he change the world and I say hard question to answer to a seven-year-old but I said I think he just did in a way and and then he had picked up on something that Obama had said him in his speech that night it's that it's gonna be a steep climb which you know wisdom from a seven-year-old and we've seen that it is and there was we didn't know each other very well on the set there were that scene was shot in about the third or fourth day and we didn't get much past that any was only 21 days shoot so everything was a was soon but I remember I think somebody held up a little portable TV thing same president-elect Barack Obama and I had to perform this scene of grief well in a state of euphoria and then I think as we were literally about shoot the sound guy took off his cans these very powerful cans they have turned up the volume and played McCain's concession speech and my spirits lifted even further [Applause] and okay and grief action and so so those are the circumstances and I don't know I mean I just said the lines and then Tom didn't cut

Channel: Colin The Firth

Views: 12,616

Rating: 4.8782611 out of 5

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Id: DCrYcIIRvw0

Length: 11min 3sec (663 seconds)

Published: Fri Nov 02 2018