A Quote by Tom Bateman

All of my friends at drama school were still sat on the floor doing voice exercises and I was doing scenes with David Tennant and Catherine Tate. — © Tom Bateman
All of my friends at drama school were still sat on the floor doing voice exercises and I was doing scenes with David Tennant and Catherine Tate.
I met Tom Baker doing a voice-over when David [Arabella's friend, David Tennant] wasn't at all well known. We were doing this voice-over together and I said to Tom, 'Oh, my friend's a really, really big Doctor Who fan,' and he replied, 'Wait!' He got his cheque book out and asked, 'What his name?' I said 'David Tennant'. He wrote, 'To David Tennant, seventeen pounds forty five', signed it and I asked him what it meant. He said, 'He'll know'
The thing that attracted me the most was comedy acting and people like Catherine Tate and Olivia Colman; people doing funny voices and accents.
Every morning when I'm thrashing around on the floor doing my solid hour of heavy exercises I'm not really doing that for anyone but myself. It makes me feel good.
If there's going to be an SAT, it's probably practical to invest in a book or perhaps in a course, but I'm sorry to say, I went to some classes that my kids took and it was clear in school that what they were doing was just SAT training.
I found myself at Cambridge, loved my course, and met these amazing people who got me heavily involved. I presumed I would have to go to drama school, but I did a play with my uni friends, who were doing lots of pub theatre in London, and through that met my agent. She said 'Don't go to drama school. I'll get you a job' and two weeks later she did.
Honestly, I was just happy to get the work. I was chuffed to bits. I know David Furnish and Elton John a bit and I remember David talking very excitedly about it. This was going back four or five years even, when we were doing Little Britain at the Hammersmith Apollo. I'd lost my voice that night, but still did the show. I remember thinking: "God, they're going to think that's my voice and I'm not going to get in the film!" But it's just been a pleasure to be a part of.
I've changed, and I've learned every single year what to do and what not to do. But I still pride myself on going out and doing the right things. Doing what I'm supposed to be doing on both ends of the floor.
I first got into acting when I was about 12. I started doing speech and drama lessons. All my friends were doing it at the time and my dad encouraged it. He encouraged any extracurricular activity.
I did dancing and singing when I was little, and then when I was 12 years old my friends were taking speech and drama at school. They were private lessons, and I started doing that. Over the years everyone else dropped out and I just kept going. I loved it.
I grew up in Cleveland and started doing plays in high school. And I went to the University of Illinois, and I majored in drama. And after school, I went up to Chicago, because I didn't really know anybody in New York or Los Angeles, and I knew people who were doing plays in Chicago.
Comedy is more difficult. You can look at scenes when you're doing a drama like, ?Maybe it works,? but in comedy, when you're doing it, either it works or it doesn't. You have to keep doing it until it does, and the requirement is more.
I love doing voiceover work. I started doing voiceover work when I had just dropped out of school, and the first few professional jobs I got were plays, but then I started making money doing voice-overs.
When I was in acting class, we did a lot of really serious scenes, and we didn't do comedic scenes. I felt like doing those scenes, it didn't come out of my mouth the right way. I don't know if it's because my voice is different, or what it is about me, but it just seemed a little off.
I was never a class clown or anything like that, but I do remember being in the first grade and my teacher, Mr. Chad, told the class one day that we were going to do some exercises. He meant math exercises, but I stood up and started doing jumping jacks. To this day, I don't know what possessed me to do that, but all my friends cracked up.
I was quite frustrated by school and found solace in going to the drama studio, doing stupid voices, and being an idiot. I then went to Guildhall School of Music and Drama and signed with a great agent in my third year.
Because when you're in drama school, you're playing multiple characters at once. You know, in the morning you're doing a Chekhov play, and then you're doing a Shakespeare workshop midday.
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