Quotes By Alan Cumming

Actually I like working kind of fast, because if you got it, why bother doing it over and over?

I started to itch to do a play again and 'Macbeth' came to the surface in my mind. I never thought I would do it in a conventional way. A sweaty Macbeth with blood on his arms coming in fresh from the battle doesn't interest me.

I'm not a fan of Twitter.

You'll see Dame Judi Dench in a Bond film, in Shakespeare and then starring in her own sitcom. You never see that here with Meryl Streep.

When there's an adult person who's scaring you, you grow up pretty quickly.

In my first year at drama school, I did this kids' show called 'Let's See.'

With 'Urban Secrets,' I just really liked the idea of wandering around chatting to people.

When you're on TV, you come into people's homes. In theater and film, they go to you - to the temple of the cinema or theater. And it's very different.

Actors aren't stupid, mostly, and if there's a sensibility and an aesthetic that a director's going for, if you're aware of that too, you can do things to help that.

I don't avoid anyone but I always think some people hate me.

So the experts think we could have an AIDS-free generation in Africa by 2015, even if the mothers are positive.

I don't feel I'm a compulsive person. I multitask. I'm really well-organised, and I have lots of people to help me.

I come more to Scotland than I ever used to, so I feel more connected to it, more part of the zeitgeist. You know when you realize you have a choice and I'm choosing my homeland. It's funny: when you get older these things creep up to you.

I like working on things that are very different and that involve different disguises.

I love a film where I get squished by two dumpsters or I fly through the air.

Pantomime is a big thing in the cultural calendar of my country, you know. So subtlety's not my forte.

I'm Scottish first, and it's odd to hear that I'm a Scottish-American.

I think you can be as big as you like as long as you mean it. I really do.

Once in a while it's good to challenge yourself in a way that's really daunting.

You do get really exhausted doing films. You work such long hours, and after a while, things can get out of perspective, just like if anyone's tired, things get on top of them.

It's really rare for film directors to be that interested in things other than themselves.

I think directing in a team is a really good idea because it stops the cult of the director as God straight away, and also you're discussing things on set so it opens it out to everyone and it becomes a totally collaborative thing. And you have someone who supports you when you're feeling a bit insecure.

I was horrified when Richard Chamberlain and Rupert Everett said gay actors should stay in the closet. They were saying to people that they should live a lie and not be liberated, to live in fear of being found out.

Macbeth was the first play I ever read.

'Macbeth' was the first play I ever read. In fact, I remember my brother Tom, who is six years older than me, coming home from school and telling me about it. He was the one that really got me going.

The thing with film and theater is that you always know the story so you can play certain cues in each scene with the knowledge that you know where the story's going to end and how it's going to go. But on television nobody knows what's going to happen, even the writers.

I like the tragedies way more than the comedies because they're so universal.

A sweaty Macbeth with blood on his arms coming in fresh from the battle doesn't interest me.

I think American actors are much more intimidated by Shakespeare.

It is not hard to feel like an outsider. I think we have all felt like that at one time or another.