I get very annoyed when people think I’m nice or diffident or a polite English gentleman. I’m a nasty piece of work, and people should know that. – Hugh Grant
I used to pre-rehearse everything and then bring my pre-rehearsed performance to the set. Now, I’m learning to let it happen in the moment. American actors are much better at that than British actors. If I knew how to trust myself, I would have been much more relaxed. Maybe I would have less gray hairs today. – Hugh Grant
I get more satisfaction out of comedy stuff. I’m a laugh tart. I make no secret of that fact. – Hugh Grant
I’m a terrible vacillator; I can be sure of something one day and change my mind the next. – Hugh Grant
Plus, teaching brings home to you very fast that you actually know nothing. I didn’t realize that before. – Hugh Grant
I think the part of my acting career where I’ve been more successful, I’ve been incredibly cushioned. People are much too nice to you. You go into politics, and people are absolutely brutal. You’ve got proper enemies, and they’re vicious. It’s very invigorating. – Hugh Grant
I have no doubt that I’d be a marvelous father. Maybe not when they’re tiny, but when they’re a little bit older, I think I’d be rather good. – Hugh Grant
My whole history of being an actor is unusual and slightly disgraceful because it should be something you burn to do. – Hugh Grant
I used to pre-rehearse everything and then bring my pre-rehearsed performance to the set. Now, I’m learning to let it happen in the moment. American actors are much better at that than British actors. If I knew how to trust myself, I would have been much more relaxed. – Hugh Grant
The only reason my work seems to be eclectic up to a certain period is because I was a failure as an actor. – Hugh Grant
I’ve certainly had a bad attitude to my job on many occasions. Not since ‘Four Weddings and a Funeral’. I’ve been rather a good boy and really given it everything when I’ve accepted a part since then, because I’ve been given much better parts in films. – Hugh Grant
I used to dream about Gorbachev before he lost power. I’d go into a panic because I was meeting him, and I had nothing to wear. I’d ask my brother what to do, and he’d tell me to wear my dressing gown. I’d tell him I can’t – it’s too horrible. He’d tell me to wear his as well. So I’d meet Gorbachev wearing two dressing gowns. – Hugh Grant
The truth is, I’d never seen a Cary Grant film. Since then I have watched his stuff and it’s astounding, but I don’t see any similarity between us. Except for the fact that I’m told he used to wear ladies’ underwear, which is something I also do. – Hugh Grant
There were various turning points, but the main one at the beginning was that I was going off to do another degree in the history of art. I would have ended up as some art historian at Sotheby’s or something. – Hugh Grant
All I know is for a number of years, if someone like me called police for a burglary, a mugging, or something happened to me, chances are that a photographer or reporter would turn up before a policeman. – Hugh Grant
‘Notting Hill?’ Does that poke fun at being British? Maybe it does. In ‘Mickey Blue Eyes,’ that’s kind of the point: the clash of worlds, the unlikely combo of a respectable Englishman and a mob guy. If you take out the Britishness, you don’t really have much. – Hugh Grant
With 2 movies opening this summer, I have no relaxing time at all. Whatever I have is spent in a drunken stupor. – Hugh Grant
But I just know from experience that accent wise, even if you’re an accent genius, crossing the Atlantic is the hardest thing in the world either way. – Hugh Grant
I was fat-shamed the other day on a British newspaper. The headline was ‘Four Bellies and a Turkey Neck.’ They weren’t wrong. I looked shocking. – Hugh Grant
After I found that I had become an actor, slightly to my surprise, I did have some insecurity, and I did take some rather strange acting classes at a place called The Actor’s Studio in London. I don’t think they did me any good at all. – Hugh Grant
Comedy is probably a way of dealing with anxiety. Sometimes it’s a way of dealing with pain. – Hugh Grant
Frankly, I think I’m marvelous in rehearsal! Then you turn the camera on, and it gets stiff and tight. And then you trudge back to your trailer feeling sad. That’s been my experience of film acting. – Hugh Grant
When I finished my degree at Oxford, I went and acted for a bit. And I was appalling. And with each part, I thought, ‘Well, that’s embarrassing. I’d better do one more to show people I’m not that bad.’ And, in fact, instead of a taking a year, that’s gone on for 35 years. – Hugh Grant
I’m not a great believer in marriages as an institution, or even in very long term relationships. I’m not sure we’re built that way. – Hugh Grant
This guy Simon Helberg, who’s in ‘Florence Foster Jenkins,’ I might have been vaguely patronizing to him because he hadn’t done films before. Gradually, you realize, not only is the guy a much bigger star than me, he’s maybe the richest man I’ve ever met. – Hugh Grant
