Colin "Quotes"
A small showcase to expose his
Wit & Intelligence
| "I do think that very often what is not revealed is more interesting than what is revealed explicitly." (Washington Post Interview May 2002) |
| "One of the great things about the art of writing when it's good is that it expresses the difficulty of communication. The moment you most want to pour your heart out is often the moment you're most stuck for words. I find those moments and those limitations very interesting." (Washington Post Interview May 2002) |
| So how do you handle it when people gush over meeting you? Sometimes it's delightful and light and easy, and people are just being complimentary in a very unassuming and pleasant way. Sometimes it's spooky and they're weird, and I don't really know how to deal with it. In the end I just try to be as civilized as possible. (InStyle March 2003) |
| "I was delighted to become a popular-culture reference point. I'm still delighted about it actually, and I still find it to be weird." (Washington Post Interview May 2002) |
| "If you think about it, I suppose I am playing somebody who's based on a character in a book who's based on a role that I played who's based on a character in a book." (Today Show Interview April 2001) |
| "It's not just that the threat of egomania and narcissism are always looming [though I suspect they always are], it's just that the things I value happen to be much more to do with the things that everyone else values: friends and family and having a life. I like the real world, I like going to the supermarket. I don't want to drift so far from that that I have a life of bodyguards and a house on Mulholland Drive. (Guardian Interview March 2001) |
| The one thing about having kids is it gets your priorities straight. And besides them, nothing else really matters." (Globe and Mail Interview September 2003) |
| CR: (laughing) They said they thought you
were terrible? [referring to English ‘fans’] CF: Oh yeah they've done that before. [using different voices and mannerisms] 'I saw you in that film last night. You were terrible, weren't you?' Or else they'll say, 'You're Colin Firth' but they'll make it sound like an accusation, so it will be, 'You're Colin Firth.' And I'll say, 'Yes, alright, you've got me. It's true, I confess.' And then they'll look at you for a second and say, 'No you're not.' 'Well, it's my name and everything, you know, okay...' 'Ma, this guy reckons he's Colin Firth.' So I'll say, 'All right, game's up. I'm not Colin Firth.' And go, 'Yes, you are, you're not fooling me.' So in this surreal situation of actually trying to convince people you're not who you say you're not (Rosie O'Donnell Show -16 April 2001 - Carolyn Raye guest host) |
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CF: Yes I did, I had a, a variety of leading ladies, one of whom was, um, [looking playfully distraught] quite special to me and I see you have a photograph of her in the CR: And she had to gain weight for the part too. CF: Yes, she, um.... CR: It's an actual pig CF: This, this is Sally and Sally loved me. I don't want to sound vain, but that pig loved me and a, she's half domestic Tamworth and half wild boar. And is therefore considered very dangerous and uh CR: Half wild boar and half what? CF: Tamworth, it's a pig, you know, Tamworth is just a pig. And the boar part of her is dangerous, I mean you know, boar's just are and um the crew all had poles and tasers and all kinds of things to keep her at bay and they were very worried for my safety and I had a scene in a cage with her, and she, she just came over, this, this ferocious creature and laid down across my feet and went to sleep. CR: [laughing] CF: And from that day on there was this extraordinary bond uh, with this, this pig just had this passion for me and every time I walked into a room full of people she would leave everyone else and just come over to me to scratch her [short pause] And we did a photo shoot, we met again about a year later [sounding, acting wistful] CR: [laughing] CF: Glossy magazine CR: You met again. Was it a clandestine thing? CF: No, no, no, there were witnesses. The photo shoot took place on the eighth floor. And pigs don't like to go into elevators. This is another thing about pigs that I didn't know, but they don't. And the only way she would go into the elevator was if I went into the elevator. And it worked. I walked in and she followed me. And again we had a brief and wonderful encounter. But I've heard nothing from her for about seven or eight years so I have to conclude she's probably shallow. CR: [laughing] CF: Ultimately CR: The pig blew you off, I can't believe it Colin. CF: Yeah. No, it's, it's heartbreaking. It was very cruel of you to have brought a photograph. (Rosie O'Donnell Show -16 April 2001 - Carolyn Raye guest host) |
| He claims his greatest handicap as an actor has always been his name. "Names are important; it's a huge part of who you are. Colin is the sort of name you give your goldfish for a joke. I was watching an episode of Blackadder, and there was a dachshund called Colin, and just his name was supposed to reduce you to fits of laughter. It has the double disadvantage of being considered commonplace, dreary and banal and, at the same time, not common at all. So I have this commonplace, dreary, banal name, but there is nobody else to share my fate. There are very few Colins around." (The Telegraph 29 August 2002) |
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CF: You don't have our school system. JS: We'd like it. You haven't seen ours buddy. CF: You don't...... JS: What is it about your school system that leads you.... CF: It's this sort of, Englishmen of a certain class. English men of a certain class thrown together with no one but a matron to look after them, and as a result, you know, we have a rather high quota of conservative politicians found dead from acts of auto-eroticism. (The Daily Show with Jon Stewart 2002) |
| 'And so Darcy is coming in with a very imprudent proposal, as he sees it. He's saying to her, "I'm going to put to you a proposal that may make me seem rash, irresponsible and even, possibly, juvenile, but I don't want you to believe I'm those things. I have thought through every detail of this; I know that my family will be angry, that people will frown on us and that our social positions are very different. So don't think that I haven't dealt with these issues -- don't imagine that I'm just some reckless schoolboy. Nevertheless, having thought it all through, I find that my love for you is so overwhelming that these objections are rendered insignificant." And, from that point of view, it's a terribly romantic proposal. ' (From Chapter 9 - The Making Of Pride And Prejudice) |
| I have no concept of how women operate, and the list of things I find baffling about them is fairly endless. I think there will always be an enigma to the relationship between the sexes, and I think the enigma is an insoluble one. I don't think we'll ever reach perfect understanding. I can't imagine it being particularly desirable to do so. I think a bit of a mystery keeps it alive, don't you? (Woman's Own 16 September 2002) |
| I don't think I am an excessively romantic guy. Romantic cliches don't appeal to me particularly. I'm not a fan of Valentine's Day, for instance, because I don't like an appointed day for roses and all that. I thinks it's important to be imaginative and act on impulse. (The One-Minute Interview - Bella) |
| Colin Firth thinks that whatever role he plays, he'll always be known as Mr. Darcy. He says: 'When the credits role in Hope Springs they should say: "Colin was played by Mr. Darcy" so people will know who I am.' (the buzz on.....NOW Magazine, 2003) |
| Indeed, quite a lot of people would leap at the opportunity to punch Grant, push him into a cake and throw him through a window, as Firth did in Bridget Jones. Decking Grant was something, he admits wickedly, "I have been wanting to do for years" |
| "I enjoy my personal life. Making a film is so all-consuming that very often your family get to see very, very little of you. You will only have a Sunday off, and if you are luck enough not to be away on location you will be able to see your family. So I tend to cherish the times in between the work, and doing absolutely everything that I suppose most people do with their evenings and weekends. When you have kids, nothing else really matters. I love the idea of a break after a film. I think if you are going to do the job properly you should recover from one, shake it off and have time to prepare your mind for the next." (The Weekend Australian Magazine - Nov 2003) |
| "The piece as a whole is a rather ambitious exercise to tell all these different kinds of love stories. It's also a very ambitious exercise to use the idea of the September 11th phone calls as a starting point, with the observation that they were all to do with love of one kind or another-that if you have one chance to say something to somebody at the end of your life, no matter what sort of person you are, no matter what sort of life you've led, no matter how awful you've been, it seems that that one thing you would communicate would be some kind of message of love. It's a very provocative thought and it's a big exercise to attempt to illustrate something of that." |
| “The cast was just fantastic but I didn’t work with them,” bemoaned Colin Firth. “They were there at the read-through but then I was in my little cottage in France for the rest of the film. But it was immensely reassuring that about 20 brilliant actors were keeping the film up, so if I was crap, the law of averages meant at least one of us would be good enough to make it work.” (Empire Magazine - November 2003) |
| 'Being a father is more like passionate love than I'd imagined,' Firth tells the paper in a move calculated to have most of Britain's 30-somethings throwing their knickers at him. 'You have the same sense of being on the brink of being out of control, and of utter euphoria. It's what makes life most worth living - no question.' (Empire Online - 20 November 2003) |
| 'To walk onto a London street dressed as a familiar character in front of 200 people, including paparazzi, was a bit like doing some variety version of what I'd already done. It was very odd. Here we are, Mark Darcy - The Live Show! We're taking Bridget on the road!' (Empire Online - 20 November 2003) |
| MV: And when he was
born, you called him 'beautiful turnip.' CF: I don't, did I say 'beautiful?' MV: I think, yes, you said he looked like a beautiful turnip..so CF: Well, he's grown out of that
now.... MV: Ah, Yes : That's adorable "But that's correcting itself now." (The View - 11 November 2003) |
| "I've never been the flavour of the month. But flavours of the month are high turnover, whereas the people who are often second choice, they're always there. I think you can have a great deal of joy out of this profession if you look to the left and right, rather than always up." (Good Taste Magazine - May 1999) |
| "you get to a certain age when to be described as a sex anything is something to be grateful for." (Today Show - 18 November 2004) |
| "he came at me with a yellow crayon, I twisted his nipple. It all got very ugly after that." (Live with Regis & Kelly November 2004) |
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