Bill Nighy reveals he stole books to prepare for an audition (Picture: Gareth Cattermole/Getty Images for BFI)
National treasure Bill Nighy has revealed he committed theft in order to prepare for his drama school audition.
The Oscar-nominated star, 74, said he applied for the Guildford School of Acting back in the day and was asked to prepare a monologue from a ‘modern play’ and a Shakespeare play for the audition.
While Nighy admitted to only applying to the school to ‘impress a girl,’ he was willing to go to great lengths to nail the audition.
Nighy told BBC Radio 4’s This Cultural Life that him and a friend: ‘Stole the complete works of Shakespeare, and we stole the complete works of George Bernard Shaw which we thought was sort of modern.’
He went on to share that while borrowing the books were an option, for some reason stealing them just felt right.
He said: ‘We could have borrowed it like everybody else, but for some reason, we were sort of developing a criminal mentality.’
Nighy revealed he only applied to drama school to ‘impress a girl’ (Picture: Getty Images)
In a hilarious mix-up, Nighy ended up learning two female parts for the audition while at the pub with his friend, ending up performing the role of Eliza Doolittle from Shaw’s play Pygmalion, and the part of Cesario in Twelfth Night.
Cesario is actually the female protagonist of the play, Viola, dressed as a man – something Nighy didn’t realise at the time.
He laughed that the audition panel was obviously confused by his material choices but invited him back ‘with more suitable material,’ ultimately giving him a place on the course.
He admitted that ending up as an actor was something of a fluke, as he only pursued it to impress his romantic interest: ‘She could have said astronaut and I would have given it a shot.’
The beloved actor previously shared he’s ‘never gotten into character’ (Picture: Axelle/Bauer-Griffin/FilmMagic)
Given that Nighy didn’t at first take acting terribly seriously, he’s certainly carved out quite a career for himself, earning his first Oscar nomination for his role in Living last year.
Though the award went to Brendan Fraser for The Whale, Nighy’s moving performance is remembered as one of his best.
He opened up about his process for getting into character in a previous interview with Metro, explaining that for him, acting has never been as cerebral as others make it out to be.
He said: ‘It’s just work. I don’t mean to say that in order to diminish it, you’re not required to experience all these things, you’re just required to act them. Obviously, that’s what acting is!
The actor said he and his friend stole the books because they were ‘sort of developing a criminal mentality’ (Picture: Getty Images)
‘It can be quite tiring but not emotionally tiring, it’s not like you have to feel this stuff. You have to kind of bogusly trigger your sensibility sometimes, or …read more
Source:: Metro
