-
The thing about acting is you have to wait to be asked to the dance.
Ben Mendelsohn -
I got the first job and kept going. Once I got a job, I very much wanted to keep getting jobs, basically. I did try to learn what I could in those first couple of decades.
Ben Mendelsohn
-
If you're going to be a father and whatnot, yeah, you better be responsible about it as best you can.
Ben Mendelsohn -
I think difficult characters are very rewarding to do. They often have facets to them and this and that.
Ben Mendelsohn -
If you've been working since you were a teenager and working at a reasonably decent level, then you don't expect that you're going to be firmly in your 40s and start moving up in the world, if you like.
Ben Mendelsohn -
Once upon a time, they thought I was a sweet, wide-eyed boy that was just trying to figure out how to kiss the girl. Lots of comic relief and adolescent yearnings.
Ben Mendelsohn -
I like to call up ghosts of things past for myself when I'm working a lot.
Ben Mendelsohn -
I think some of my favorite Australian films were shot by people that are not Australian. And I think when Dean Semler did 'Dances with Wolves,' for instance, that's a very different-looking Western than what you've seen much of before. It's very rich, color-wise. But we've got our own very proud thing going on.
Ben Mendelsohn
-
It's good to surf whatever waves are going on right there as they're happening.
Ben Mendelsohn -
I'm very cagey by nature.
Ben Mendelsohn -
'Star Wars' is populated by so many great types; who wouldn't want to be a Han Solo kind of dude?
Ben Mendelsohn -
Before 'Animal Kingdom,' I wasn't particularly thought of in villainous roles.
Ben Mendelsohn -
There are always dimensions, and the way they get expressed is through the writing and the actors and the director you get to work with on that day. But there are always dimensions, outside of really basic stuff for very young people where it needs to be very clear.
Ben Mendelsohn -
'Animal Kingdom' is a lot of things, but it's not heartwarming.
Ben Mendelsohn
-
As an outsider in America, you do see the kind of hypocrisy that's rampant there.
Ben Mendelsohn -
I never felt like someone who was boyish and coming to terms with asking girls out or anything like that, which was what 'The Big Steal' and 'Spotswood' were about. But I guess that's the impression I left on people.
Ben Mendelsohn -
Fassbender is fearless; he's a fearless actor.
Ben Mendelsohn -
My favorite-ever version of 'King Lear' is the 1971 film by Peter Brooks. He has this enormous fur thing, and it adds enormous gravitas.
Ben Mendelsohn -
As an actor who has spent twenty years trying to crack America, the day I reached the 'Bloodline' set and found my name on a chair next to Sissy Spacek's was the happiest of my working life.
Ben Mendelsohn -
I basically sat around unemployed in Sydney for three years straight, and the two things that saved me were the rugby league and my dog.
Ben Mendelsohn
-
I grew up loving the John Wayne and Clint Eastwood westerns.
Ben Mendelsohn -
It would be excellent to do a 'Star Wars.'
Ben Mendelsohn -
I have an intensive relationship with the thing that I'm working on, and I hope that comes through. It's better for me to not worry about the things I can't fix once they're done.
Ben Mendelsohn -
Let me give you a little Mendelsohn 101: I came up in television in the early- to mid- 1980s in Australia.
Ben Mendelsohn