Quotes By Alan Rickman

The audience should feel like voyeurs. Their response is absolutely crucial.

Three children have become adults since a phone call with Jo Rowling, containing one small clue, persuaded me that there was more to Snape than an unchanging costume, and that even though only three of the books were out at that time, she held the entire massive but delicate narrative in the surest of hands.

If people want to know who I am, it is all in the work.

Acting touches nerves you have absolutely no control over.

Talent is an accident of genes - and a responsibility.

If only life could be a little more tender and art a little more robust.

I knew with Snape I was working as a double agent, as it turns out, and a very good one at that.

I have a love-hate relationship with white silk.

I approach every part I'm asked to do and decide to do from exactly the same angle: who is this person, what does he want, how does he attempt to get it, and what happens to him when he doesn't get it, or if he does?

Who I am gets in the way of people looking innocently at the parts I play.

When I get off the plane in England I always feel about two inches shorter.

I was 7, and I remember being given a part in a play and thinking, This is exciting.

One longs for a director with a sense of imagination.

I love working in New York theater.

The point about a great story is that it's got a beginning, a middle and end.

I think there's some connection between absolute discipline and absolute freedom.

Somebody with Debbie Reynolds' features doesn't get cast as the Wicked Witch.

I don't think it's right that everybody knows everything about me.

I'm always aware of the camera and it feels like that's the audience.

Nothing gives me as much pleasure as travelling. I love getting on trains and boats and planes.

I'm very aware that when one is acting in the theater, you do become kind of animal about it. And you're reliant on instincts rather than tact a lot of the time.

I mean, language fascinates me anyway, and different words have different energies and you can change the whole drive of a sentence.

If you spend any time in Los Angeles, there's only one topic of conversation.

I think worrying things are going on in England - a real apathy.

In theater, you've got to be aware of your whole body because it involves stamina. It involves two-and-a-half hours and a sustained release of energy, maybe for six months.

I'm a quite serious actor who doesn't mind being ridiculously comic.

So you can't judge the character you're playing ever.

There's a voice inside you that tells you what you should do.

It is an ancient need to be told stories. But the story needs a great storyteller. Thanks for all of it, Jo.

Actors are agents of change. A film, a piece of theater, a piece of music, or a book can make a difference. It can change the world.