A Quote by Charlotte Ritchie

And since I have become an actor, not one person has asked me what degree I got. — © Charlotte Ritchie
And since I have become an actor, not one person has asked me what degree I got.
I grew up doing theater when I was very young - always enjoyed it. Studied it in college, got my degree in it, and never really had the guts to do it professionally. But one summer, a friend of mine was with an extras agency and asked me if I wanted to be an extra with him in a movie, and I was, like, "Sure." At lunch, the writer came up to me and asked me to audition for a role. I got it, and it sort of snowballed from there.
Any gay person understands at some point that he or she has to disappear, to become invisible. That's very difficult. You somehow have to kill yourself. This is asked of people who haven't got the tools to understand that it's all a social construction, and that they shouldn't inferiorize themselves. This is asked of little kids. But I still live in the same outcome.
I think with acting, since I became an actor... I, as a person, have become more confident and I have really come out of my shell somewhat... and back to myself, you know.
And as an actor - or even as a person in the industry - if you're unwilling to change, you're just going to get swamped. You've got to be flexible, and you've got to go with the flow. That's what I try to do as an actor.
Listen, here's the thing about an English degree - if you sat somebody down and asked them to make a list of the writers they admire over the last hundred years, see how many of them got a degree in English.
I was not going to be an actor. I was an engineer in physics. That's what I did: I graduated with a physics degree, and I had become a little bit distressed that I'd have to work for somebody - anybody! And I thought, "I'm not going to make a mark on anything. If I can't express myself, then I don't know what the heck I'm going to do with this life." I think it was just one of those germs that said, "No, no, no, you've got to say things. You've got to tell people things. You've got to express your opinion in this life, because that's how you started."
You don't go to Berkeley to become an actor. In fact, I don't think you go to any school to become an actor. You've just sort of got to go out there and act.
A person once asked me, in a provocative manner, if I approved of homosexuality. I replied with another question: 'Tell me: when God looks at a gay person, does he endorse the existence of this person with love, or reject and condemn this person?' We must always consider the person.
I mean, if President Reagan could be an actor and become a President, if Michael Douglas is your next choice, maybe I could become an actor. And I've got a good pension; I can work cheap, which is unusual around here.
I almost got a psychology degree, I almost got a philosophy degree. I kept changing it so they couldn't make me graduate. I studied anthropology and eastern religion, epistomology, and astronomy... I took every interesting course I could find for nine years.
You reminded me of a quote that my acting teacher Stella Adler wrote in her book ['The Art of Acting'], which I asked her to sign: "The young actor feels some greatness inside themselves that they want to give back to the world." That resonated with me, but I didn't really understand what she was talking about until much later, in the way you surmised that my struggle to become an actor was from being this kind of introverted young boy.
When I auditioned for drama college, they asked me to do my Shakespeare. I couldn't do it. They asked me to do my modern, and I couldn't do it. They asked me if I had a song prepared, and I said 'No,' so I sang 'Happy Birthday.' And I did a reasonable improvisation, a reasonable one, nothing special at all. I don't know how I got in, but I did.
Then I was working in a store in Newark, New Jersey, and I saw an actor in person, and I got so excited. My whole day changed. That's when I decided to challenge myself to make my dreams become a reality.
In WWE there's a huge degree of acting you need to have to become legendary, to become popular. You have to become a great actor in WWE and that's something I've honed from a young age. I could never be the biggest guy on the show when I first started wrestling; it was all about the giants. But I could have the biggest personality, the biggest character.
I didn't become an actor to make money. And I didn't become an actor to be famous - though people always gasp if you say that, as if it's unfathomable that an actor doesn't want to be a star.
It's very, very important to me, no matter who the person is, to play that person with the utmost degree of truth that I'm able to bring. But playing a character like Jack Sparrow or Willy Wonka, that requires nothing but a degree of responsibility to the intent of the story - responsibility to the film-maker to deliver the goods.
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