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Martin Freeman [1971-0] English
Rank: 101
Actor


Martin John Christopher Freeman is an English actor, who became known for portraying Tim Canterbury in the original UK version of sitcom mockumentary The Office, Dr. 

Friendship, Christmas, Computers, Design, Famous, Good, History, Marriage, Trust



QuoteTagsRank
I can spot someone with similar fashion sense to me a mile off.
101
I like things that are simple, such as an alarm clock.
102
Humour is - how do I say this without sounding pompous - it's a huge part of my life.
103
There was very little drama and performance at my school, so I've never forgotten the people who did encourage me and I've thought whether it would be a good idea to even get in touch with them and just say thanks, because they really opened a door for me mentally and emotionally - that's really important. Good
104
People misunderstand me.
105
I would wear a full-length cape if I could get away with it - I do love a good swirl in a fog.
106
I'm not posh or common, I'm in between.
107
I've always loved Christmas and that's not really gone away from me from being a child to now. It's always a magical time and I'm unashamed in my love for Christmas. Christmas
108
I'm a big believer that life changes as much as you want it to.
109
I don't get cast as the guy who steps off a yacht in a white linen suit with a martini.
110
You absorb 2,000 years of history just by being near the Thames. History
111
I did a play once where a reviewer said, 'Martin Freeman's too nice to play a bad guy.' And I thought: 'Well, bad guys aren't always bad guys, you know?' When I see someone play the obvious villain, I know it's false.
112
I think I'm less gloomy than I used to be - I've got a very supportive other half.
113
I think what 'The Hobbit' and Middle-earth deal in are quite universal and timeless themes of honour and love and friendship... so they're things that do resonate with people. Friendship
114
My idea of a good night out is staying in.
115
Half of us are partly German! Half our language and culture, generally, in Anglo-Saxon terms, is German.
116
I don't want to sound like a grumpy old man, but nothing winds me up more than people saying, 'Chill out' to me when I'm irritated!
117
I have a very extreme state of mind. Things are very black or very white.
118
There are lots of things that keep me awake at night, but work isn't one of them. I mean, no-one's going to die if someone doesn't like what I do. So I don't feel a great pressure.
119
If I could get bands to come and play in my house, I'd like that.
120
The Marx Brothers isn't subtle, and that's hilarious.
121
I think people just like seeing friendship. I think people like seeing people who just drive each other up the wall, but at same time, can't live without each other. Friendship
122
Your slippers last a lot longer in your bedroom. On a film set, they do get very scuffed up.
123
Any pigeonhole is something to be rebelled against.
124
If you are a plumber, you can work on a shed, or you can work on a mansion. It's just scale.
125
I value being able to go into a record shop and people leaving me alone.
126
I don't think anyone looks into their family tree and expects it to come up smelling of roses.
201
With superheroes and comics and fantasy and sci-fi being absolutely the popular currency in cinema, it's like people have said in endless magazines, it's the revenge of the geeks and all that. There's some truth in that.
202
Without sounding overly pompous about it, I don't really trust certainty in anything, actually. Especially as I get older. Except love. I'm certain of love, I guess. Trust
203
Michael Caine, Tom Courtenay and Al Pacino made me want to act. I've always been interested in men with a vulnerable side.
204
To my mind there are not enough things that show the Nazis as human, as smart people, charismatic people, who are not inhuman naturally. But who are able to be fantastically inhuman when they choose to be.
205
I hate the fact that so much of our life is computerised rather than mechanised.
206
I'm not particularly affable in real life, I have to tell you. I've got that side to me, of course, but that's not all I am.
207
Like any friendship or marriage, familiarity breeds more contempt, and love, and everything. Friendship, Marriage
208
I grew up in the suburbs, so I remember arriving at Waterloo and seeing Big Ben and the coloured lights on top of the Southbank Centre and thinking, 'Wow!'
209
I don't want to be poor, of course. But I try not to make that the guiding force behind whether I choose to do something or not.
210
I've got a stag weekend coming up and I've said I'm not doing anything more than a few drinks. I won't have it. I'll go home and watch Antiques Roadshow.
211
Most people have a passive relationship with music and clothes, with culture. But music was my first contact with anything creative. Music is it, as far as I'm concerned.
212
I'm one of the few people I know who believes in God.
213
Name anything - high-definition TV, computer obsolescence - and I'm pretty much annoyed by it.
214
Being a mod is more of a sensibility than a style.
215
When I wear jeans I want to look like a man, not a child.
216
I don't think it was a surprise that I ended up as an actor, and it was anything but a disappointment.
217
In London we give ourselves a pat on the back, rightly, for not killing one another, for our prejudice being subtle rather than lethal.
218
I've got an overly developed sense of what selling out is, and I of course worry about it too much.
219
Acting is the only thing I'm even vaguely good at and acting is something that I think I do know about.
220
Disappointment is an endless wellspring of comedy inspiration.
221
I love home. I'd rather be at home than anywhere else.
222
I've been doing interviews for years, and in all that time, I've virtually never read one and gone, 'Yep, factually and tonally that's exactly what happened.' Pretty much never.
223
What makes Shakespeare eternal is his grasp of psychology. He knew how to nail stuff about us as human beings.
224
I am a fan of the Coen brothers. I'm not a fanatic. I'm a big admirer. They create unique worlds, and there is a real atmosphere to their films. Not everyone can get that. That's a massive part of their appeal: you can recognise them. Like all the great directors or artists, you know it when you see it.
225
I think the world needs to see more of my face.
226
I don't write anything off without reading a script, and if it's a good one, I'll consider it, whether it's for $20 or a million dollars.
301
When people bully us, we are complicit in it in some way. We do allow it to happen to some extent.
302
I'm geek royalty now.
303
I think the hardest part about anything you do for 18 months is just keeping yourself together for 18 months.
304
I've always been attracted to darkness.
305
I'm always interested with other actors in what their process is, and are they still interested in acting, as opposed to being a star.
306
I like the quiet life sometimes. I also love a bustling press conference sometimes as well. I love a 600 metre red carpet.
307
I wanted to be an actor because I saw 'Dog Day Afternoon,' you know what I mean?
308
I'm afraid I don't have a very pragmatic or unromantic view of props. I don't imbue them with any great sense of mystery or anything.
309
I think when see you a character on the screen who is actually being touched by the world, and the stuff is actually landing on him, it makes you empathize.
310
I love watching Billy Bob, just as a punter anyway. I like his work. But working with him is really easy and really straight-forward. He's immediately good. He doesn't have to work up to it. He doesn't make your life difficult. He listens. He's a very good listener, in terms of his acting.
311
I was on record before I did 'The Hobbit,' saying I don't care at all about 3D. And I suppose I should now say I care a lot about 3D. I've always loved 3D, I think everything should be 3D, and I think it's just a shame 'The Godfather' wasn't in 3D.
312
I love eating. I mean, I really, really love eating.
313
'Sherlock' is one of the biggest things I will do, ever - we could never have predicted that level of insanity around the series.
314
I like uncertainty in roles, and I like uncertainty in art, really.
315
I think the only directing I'd be any good at is theatre directing. It's the only thing I can see myself doing.
316
Why does everyone have to pretend to be stupid and not know long words?
317
This isn't meant to make me sound interesting and rock 'n' roll, but I wouldn't want to live with me a lot of the time.
318
You could say I'm a mod, but with a small 'm'; I don't wear a parka, but I do question what I wear and what I listen to, which is what it's all about.
319
Most actors are either a shower of bloody scruffs or think they should dress like Hamlet off stage.
320
I love that pre-mod jazz look of the late Fifties, the Steve McQueen style that influenced the British modernists.
321
I only really watch my own films, I don't watch any other films and I don't particularly like any other actors.
322
I like bootcut jeans in a plain style with a nice line.
323
I love a good suit.
324
I was probably cool around the end of 2002.
325
My mum was Labour-voting, but wanted us to know we were important. Basically, everyone's equal, but you, my children, are a bit better.
326
I've never been to a festival. I'm a creature of habit, mashed-potato comfort, I like rugs. Our sofa's squishy. Maybe too squishy - it's hard to get up sometimes.
401
I've always got my eye on my deathbed.
402
There are still things technically about films that I think are a mystery to me and I want to remain a mystery. I don't particularly want to know what everyone's job is because I've got lines to learn.
403
I've got no anti-America or anti-Hollywood kick, it's just that I never wanted to go and kick my heels around L.A. for six months hoping something would happen.
404
There is nothing far-fetched about disappointment as a subject for comedy. It's something we are all too familiar with.
405
Comedy can't be about continuous success.
406
I like out, I like the outside world.
407
I buy DVDs. I don't really buy CDs unless they're for other people.
408
I didn't audition for 'Fargo.' It was a straight offer.
409
The reason I've never gone for pilot season even as a younger actor, and wouldn't entertain that sort of thing now, is the idea of signing a piece of paper that binds me for six or seven years.
410
Americans assume all British people have at least one servant.
411
I'm very proud of 'The Office' - it was one of the best things I'll ever do. But you do become a slight victim of your own success in the sense that people think that's you, that's what you are, and that's what you'll play forever.
412
Trouble is, some accents lend themselves to comedy.
413
I like talky scenes.
414
Don't get me wrong - I'm a big fan of things American - but when American people do British stuff, it's so universally dreadful.
415
I can't actually believe how good 'The Sopranos' is. I genuinely am dumbfounded by it. It's like when you realize how good The Beatles are, and you think, 'How did they do that?'
416
I don't want to be alone; the thing I love about acting is the other people you're doing it with.
417
You have to, in a way, just get your head down and do the work and not expect every day to bring riches and not expect every minute to bring wild excitement, 'cause it just doesn't. It doesn't on films, anyway.
418
We all know that people who've never been on a film set think it's way more glamorous than the people who work on them.
419
I love the smaller scenes. I love the smaller, slightly more theatrical scenes.
420
Acting is reacting, and it's always easier to react when someone is doing a good job.
421
I have played nasty people, but not everyone has seen that stuff. Before 'The Office,' I mainly got cast as little toe-rags.
422
I'm not a writer, director or producer.
423
I could say, 'I want to play a French-African humpback,' but I probably won't get that role.
424
You're not fully you until life has booted you in the behind.
425
There are always challenges to green screen.
426
My ambition is to do what I like and to do good things that I might not have done before.
501
My first engagement with any art was music.
502
As an actor, you know there are things you get asked to do that you do quite well, with less effort.
503
Although there's an inherent light-heartedness to 'Sherlock,' I slightly err towards not doing the comedy.
504
Please God, I'll never be in a war zone, but everything I sort of know about people who come back is that it's a hard transition to make. I mean, even if you've not been in a war, even if you've just been in the Forces, you come back and probably have more fights in civilian life.
505
On the surface, you think you wouldn't have to think at all about being asked to play Bilbo in 'The Hobbit.' It's not prison; it's a good gig. But you know it's going to take a long time, and it does. There are times when you thought: 'Gee, I've not seen my house for months.'
506
It's more fun playing someone who isn't just a bad guy.
507
I've tried not to treat Shakespeare as a marble giant.
508
Rehearsals are one of my favourite things in the world.
509
You don't want your children to look at you like you are anything special other than their dad.
510
In my life, the strongest evidence of any fandom is 'Sherlock' - 'Hobbit' fans are positively restrained.
511
True heroics, obviously, is not the absence of fear, but having that fear and doing something anyway.
512
I read 'Animal Farm' when I was 11, and it remained my favorite book, really.
513
It's a funny thing, 'The Office,' because millions and millions and millions and millions of people didn't watch it. But culturally, it is more of a phenomenon than almost anything else I can remember as far as British television is concerned.
514
I have never been in, nor have I had any strong particular desire to be in, what is termed a costume drama, but I keep forgetting to think of 'Charles II' as a costume drama.
515
Fans want to see a story with characters, and they want to see a story.
516
As soon as you get two actors in a room and they're locking eyes, they're doing a scene.
517
Actors are people who are doing a job they want to do, which isn't the case for many of the people who watch what we do.
518
Organised religion, organised anything, requires commitment and requires an engagement with something. A lot of the time, we don't want to commit.
519
I know very few people who have literally improvised a film from start to finish.
520
My relationship with my belief has never been easy.
521
My default state is wariness.
522
All my life, I've felt people are looking at me. So, when I became known, it was like, 'I'm not imagining this any more. People genuinely are staring at me. Oh, Christ, now they're coming over!'
523
I think acting is all about the other people. Sounds like a worthy thing to say, but it's true.
524
I've got a pretty good musical ear, and I can pick things up.
525
Whenever someone says to my mum: 'How's your son doing?' she says: 'Which one?' If you're a parent, you're not going to go: 'Oh I'll concentrate on the famous one.' Famous
526
'Sherlock' is beautifully done, if I may say so myself. Even if I wasn't in it, I would like the show.
601
I always kind of think if The Beatles were still around now, people would've lost interest quite a long time ago. Seven years of recording - it's there forever. I think not outstaying your welcome is a vital ingredient.
602
The design of 'Love Actually,' the typeface, the basic line of that poster and that DVD cover has been ripped off so many times. Design
603
'The Hobbit' would have been very difficult to pass on, do you know what I mean? It's not the kind of ship that comes into dock very often.
604
I like anything with my face on it, just from an aesthetic point of view.
605
I hope I inspire children to make films.
606
To be honest, if people thought my performance in 'The Office' was the same as my performance in 'The Hobbit,' it would tell me everything I needed to know about what they know about acting.
607
I enjoy fighting scenes. I like fighting in film. I like pretending to fight in films.
608
I don't have sentimental attachments to characters at all.
609
Most people aren't these grandstanding heroes.
610
I suppose the real cult things now are independent films made for a million pounds.
611
I've had several really tangible dreams about UFOs, and they've been amazing!
612
When I was at youth theatre and drama school, I never thought people would mistake me for a stand-up.
613
Coming back from doing 'The Hobbit,' you think 'Sherlock' is realistic, but of course, it's not that realistic.
614
Like, honest to God, I don't expect people to be into what I'm into.
615
I don't like affectation.
616
If everyone's just saying what they feel and doing whatever they want, there's no drama in the world. And there's also no truth to it, 'cause that's just not the truth.
617
It's always the case, whenever you're doing someone real, how much you want to do an impression or a characterisation. If I was doing Churchill, or Gandhi - people know exactly how they talked, walked.
618
It would be a shame for me if I were to become 'Mr. Half-Hour Sitcom.'
619
Even someone as truly dark as Lorne Malvo is still very attractive, and you want to spend time with him because he's a fun character.
620
I don't like 'cool telly.'
621
Being an actor is just like being any other sort of self-employed person - we're all just happy to have a job in the first place, but we also thrive off the uncertainty of it.
622
Are there many Tims in America? I don't know if I can think of many American Tims.
623
I've been well-known in Britain for a long time.
624
It's hard talking about acting, in a way, because it's like explaining a joke: I do think it loses something in the telling.
625
I have less than no interest in trying to replicate another brilliant actor's work, thank you very much.
626
We can all look on the Internet and go, 'He hates me! Oh, but she loves me. Oh, but he hates me,' you know. And that way, madness lies.
701
I have no opinion on 48 frames a second at all. I'd be completely unsuitable to talk about that.
702
My job as an actor is for you, so why should my private life be for you, too? That's not fair.
703
There are about 20 people in my life that I want to love me, and none of them are the 'Daily Mail.'
704
My main priority in any job is when is the soonest I can get back to the three people I love most in the world.
705
I'm quite a disciplinarian: I can be a shouter. But I can be a very demonstrative kisser and hugger.
706
If it were purely up to me, my kids would probably be vegetarian Catholic Marxists.
707
I like life to surprise me.
708
It's more fun to keep stuff secret.
709
I like the idea of not everything happening between two human beings to be everyone's property.
710
I can live without endless television programmes and films just centered around computers. I can sort of live without that. Computers
711
There's a difference between the parts that I play and who I am and who people think I am. There's quite a big discrepancy sometimes between those things.
712
I hadn't grown up with 'The Hobbit;' I hadn't grown up with 'Lord of The Rings,' anything like that.
713
I like being called 'Mr. Freeman' occasionally.
714
The best of American television is thought-provoking, original, brilliant, exciting - from 'The Sopranos' on, whether it's 'The Wire' or 'Breaking Bad' or 'House of Cards,' they're fantastic pieces of art.
715
Television is where the great movies that used to exist have gone.
716
'The Hobbit's a big gig. It's a huge circus that you become a part of.
717
If you're alive for more than five minutes, you're going to be disappointed.
718
If you want your film to be instantly green-lit, your first approach is not to go to a relatively unknown English actor. They're not going to throw millions of dollars at you for that.
719
We all know the films that have affected us from the age of nine onwards, that mean so much to us.
720
I look like the man in the moon.
721
As soon as a job finishes, I am done with it. When I'm really, really enjoying the job, I love the job, I want it to end because it's supposed to.
722
Not all art is great; most of it's rubbish.
723
I work in public.
724
I've not been called on to do a lot of accent work.
725
I want to inspire children to be obsessed over jewellery.
726
I have quite catholic taste in music.
801
I've always slightly envied other actors I know who have different reputations. I think, 'God, you don't get people coming up to you, going, 'Hey!' - because they're scared of you.'
802
I've always liked clothes, since I was a kid.
803
I'm just a sucker for a good script.
804
I wasn't like a Fifties dad.
805

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