My character in 'La Haine,' he's not bad; he's unhappy, and usually, people are like that. Most of us are angry.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
He who is incapable of feeling strong passions, of being shaken by anger, of living in every sense of the word, will never be a good actor.
The interesting thing about Hain is that he's not a very interesting character. He's not fabulously clever. He's not a great policeman. He's not hugely charismatic. I'd describe him as a kind-of Chekhovian character. He's an ordinary bloke, to whom extraordinary things have happened. Which is quite hard to play, I have to say.
Angry or not. It's a human emotion. But you can't walk around being angry all the time. What a dull person you'd have to be!
In all of us, there is a struggle between the good and the bad. It makes it more palpable and real to play such people as an actor.
I think that characters who are nice all the time and who you sympathize with can get really boring.
I just love real characters; they're not pretentious, and every emotion is on the surface, they're regular working people. Their likes, their dislikes, their loves, their hates, their passions; they're all right there on the surface.
Anger is never without a reason, but seldom with a good one.
Anger makes dull men witty, but it keeps them poor.
I don't think Hamlet is mad, nor is he predisposed to be a gloomy or tragic figure.
I really love the idea of the poetically mad - the character that is imbued with the romantic madness. Like River from 'Firefly' or Drusilla from 'Buffy.' Someone dangerously unhinged, where you're really not sure they're going to be reliable minute-to-minute.