Michael Ball

“תיאטראות ובמות הם מקומות מסוכנים.”

“מחזות זמר מאפשרים עומק של רגש שלא מקבלים בצורת משחק אחרת, האקורדים מתחלפים, המילים ממש משפיעות על אנשים.”

“אני משחק תפקידים, אבל כשאני מחוץ לבמה, אני תמיד משתדל להיות אני.”

“I've got soft features, curly hair with blonde bits and dimples. People think of me as a singer, an entertainer, someone who's always there with a ready smile.”

“For the millennium, we flew to Kuala Lumpur and then on to Pangkor Laut, a nearby island.”

“I love my fans and they follow me everywhere - I recognise a lot of faces.”

“I was very close to my grandmother, Agnes Parry. She was a typical matriarchal leader of the family and the community. People looked up to her and would always go to her for advice and help.”

“You can't make a star - they just have it.”

“I used to bottle things up.”

“Musicals allow a depth of emotion that you don't get in another form of acting, the chord changes, the lyrics really affect people, so that in two hours, you've forgotten about things.”

“I sometimes feel I want to release an album without people knowing it is me.”

“I think shows like 'Dancing on Ice,' 'X Factor' and 'Britain's Got Talent' make great telly, but I'd never want to be contestant. I'm far too insecure and competitive. Also, working in theatre, you're being judged all the time - and I'd rather not be told I'm awful in front of millions of people!”

“When I was 19 and at drama school, a couple of friends and I decided to drive from Guildford through France, down to the heel of Italy and then take a ferry to Greece - in an MG Midget. On our second day, in France, we were in a very bad accident and wrote off the car so we had to go home. But we then flew out instead and went island hopping.”

“I send a text every day to my partner Cath, saying 'I love you.'”

“What does annoy me is when critics use me to ridicule my audience. All the stuff about 'Tesco housewives' and 'the blue-rinse brigade.'”

“I got involved in the Surrey Country youth theatre which led me to go to drama school where I realised that this was going to have to be my career, and I was really lucky to get big breaks early on.”

“The bravery and pioneering of early Hollywood was absolutely incredible.”

“I never thought of myself as a particularly controversial figure.”

“I love doing characters that surprise people and showing what I am, which is an actor, first and foremost.”

“The first time I encountered Stephen Sondheim was like everyone else: through snatches of old songs people performed in drama school, through 'Send in the Clowns,' which everyone knew. I wasn't aware at the time that he was the writing force behind 'West Side Story' and 'Gypsy.'”