Off-Cut: Ten

WILLIAM HURT always requests six weeks rehearsal time according to an interview with Nigel Farndale published in Good Weekend, The Age Magazine May 13th 2000. And apparently it's a request that is rarely fulfilled. But it's thorough rehearsal which delivers the best performance, he believes.

He likens the actor's process to that of hitting a golf ball. "You have to think about it for a long time before you can stop thinking about it and do it."

He also provides another interesting quote about acting process from this interview. He says he feels he is never coordinated in a role until he has stopped telling the various parts of his body what to do. "Acting is not lying. It's not false emotion."

This interview reveals WILLIAM HURT as a very complex man. The secret of his success as an actor is the distilling of these complex thoughts into a simple exterior with a complex interior.

May 2000