Sharlto Copley

“You need that marketing power. You need to go do the interviews. You need to put yourself out there and risk and be open to the fact that people are going to not like you, and they are just going to rip you apart, and whatever you say in an interview can get quoted out of context.”

“The acting world is a humbling experience, I find.”

“Different people call me different things. In America, people really struggle with my name, so I don't have a nickname as such. I've had Sharlito, Sheldon, Charldo, really interesting variations on the name.”

“I'm a huge fan of Dustin Hoffman.”

“I walked out of... was it 'Stardust?' That thing with the witches? I was so looking forward to it, but I just couldn't handle it, man. Ten minutes in, and I was gone. I didn't have to walk out of 'Transformers 2' because I didn't go. I loved the first 'Transformers.' I loved it, but I heard too many of my friends walked out of the second one.”

“I did a lot of acting, funnily enough, unprofessionally, as a kid. From when I was 10 years old until I was about 19, I was always doing little sketches with my friends, and doing different accents and voices.”

“I would love to do more acting; I really would love to do it, particularly character acting. I'm a character type of actor; I love situations where I've got a bit of room to improvise on the character.”

“I'm not interested in going to casting after casting, trying to get into that game. So there is a part of me that knows that I will do more characters, even if I have to produce those projects myself to get those projects out there. If the right characters come along, I would love to. I would jump at the chance.”

“To be honest, I'm probably more of a comedy person, actually. I really enjoy the comedy stuff, and I've got some things I'll be working on that I think are just different ways of combining genres in comedy and drama and action.”

“I'm not particularly fond of playing villains. I do want to be a working actor, and I've had to look at what was offered to me, what roles I could get, and what I could do with them. Even though I'm not drawn to putting those kinds of darker characters out there, I think it's an interesting challenge.”

“I think every soft child in the world gets damaged. All of of us come into the world and get damaged. It's just a matter of how much.”

“In America, people really struggle with my name, so I don't have a nickname as such. I've had Sharlito, Sheldon, Charldo, really interesting variations on the name. Some of them can get it, but many can't.”

“I always find the more you can draw on real life characters, people, situations, it works better. Certainly for designing a character, I prefer to draw on real people rather than other guys I've seen in movies, rather than 'here's my version of Clint Eastwood' or whoever.”

“To some degree, Hollywood doesn't know what to do with me because the characters I do are so different. But hopefully, that will give me longevity.”

“I feel so comfortable in an acting role, you know, as an actor. Maybe it's because I came into it late. If anything, I've felt frustrated that I can't carry a film because everything since 'District 9' has been supporting roles.”

“I would definitely describe myself as a workaholic.”

“I suppose comedy is my first love, in a way.”

“Interestingly enough, the game I played the most ever was Street Fighter II, back in the day. That would probably still stick as one of my favourite games. Just being a bit of an '80s guy.”