TV is a very sensitive thing. If you're not happy with what you're doing, I don't think you should do it because you will do it for awhile.
Personally I don't believe in bad people. I think there's always a reason for people acting badly.
I don't want to ever think that I don't know what to do. I want to deal with my own things, to perform my own roles, to be like, "I did this."
To me, it's all about inspiration. What gets me creatively excited is a challenge.
There's something I love about how stark the contrast is between January and June in Sweden.
There's always some extent of luck going into getting a job. I try not to think too much about my own looks or how I work. There's a danger in becoming too self-aware.
The soundtrack for 'Hemlock Grove' got me into all this goth folk gypsy music like the Dead Brothers.
The horror fan base is fantastic. It really has devoted fans, and I like that aspect of the genre. The people who are making it are always really wonderfully nerdy, creative people, which I always love.
Sweden is a small country and, well, our family's pretty prominent in that world, I guess. And I really didn't like the sound of just being 'the fourth acting Skarsgard.'
Playing Pennywise will change my life and career forever. It's going to change my path. And who knows where that path might lead me?
One of my dad's biggest passions is cooking, so we always had good food at home.
Normally, when you do a movie, you have those mundane days when it's like, 'Today is the scene where I get coffee.'
My height can be a problem. A lot of directors and photographers are sometimes not happy because I'm pretty tall and especially if I work with short actors the difference can be pretty massive.
Louis CK is so brilliant and smart and clever and funny and also very bizarre.
In terms of jobs, I'm an actor. There's gotta' be depth there. I'd never say yes to something just to play the hot guy. That's not what I'm interested in.
In movies we tend make things black and white: you're either this, or you're that.
If you ask anybody what they think of clowns, it's associated as much or more with something crazy and scary as it is something joyful.
I've never understood the appeal of feeling really scared. I know that people do find it really thrilling. For me, artistically, it needs to be worth the effort of me feeling uncomfortable watching it.
I've lived in California for six years and I've never surfed.
I've always been a night person. There's a sense of virtue attached to getting up in the morning and doing things and starting the day, and I always felt bad for not being that person.
I'm always looking for something that's real and that's got meat on it. I think it's artistic suicide if you're too vain, or if you're afraid to play ugly. I would never fall for that.
I'm a pretty private person, so I don't mind not being recognized.
I wouldn't want to be associated with one character, because I want to be able to do different roles.
I worked with Lady Gaga for a day on a video shoot. It was crazy; we had a lot of fun. I had a great time.
I think I've gotten that before - people have been like, 'Oh, you have a creepy stare.' My energy personally is not as threatening, I don't think.
I think every character that I play has a certain sort of tone or an energy level to them.
I started acting when I was 9.
I spent a lot of time on film sets with my dad at work, and as a kid, that's a very appealing thing, to watch grownups get to play dress-up and pretend that they're different people - and then get paid for it!
I see myself as most people see themselves, you have good days and bad days. I don't think I'm better looking now than I did three years ago.
I needed to be myself and find my own identity.
I liken every character that I do to a relationship that you're in.
I have three older brothers, and each one of them has chosen one of my parents' education. Two of them are actors, and the third is a doctor as my mother is.
I come from a family of pacifists, so it's not like I was going to join the war. Sweden is not like the States or England where you might get sent to Afghanistan next month.
I can't see myself as a very domesticated person, with a suburb house and stuff like that.
I can deal with it now, but 13 is a tough age to be recognized and famous. It's a tough age, period.
I always feel like a foreigner in America.
Between 9 A.M. and 10 A.M. is usually when I get up.
Acting was always there, it's true. But for a long time, in my teenage years, I wasn't sure about it - not because I didn't like it, but I didn't want people to think I hadn't earned it.
A true artist, in my mind, is willing to fail sometimes, because if you're not brave enough to say yes and follow your gut, it's never going to be good.
A character on screen that's the 'good guy' or the 'bad guy,' they're never interesting. There's got to be an internal struggle, the duality is important to find.
I did a lot of research on what solitary confinement does to you, how you become acclimated to being surrounded by people again after being by yourself for such a long time. It's really a horrific thing. It's definitely worth considering it as torture. We're just not meant to be in solitary confinement.
I love the story behind the Vasa Museum: in the 17th century, the Swedish king was trying to make a statement by building a huge ship that would sail around Europe carrying the Swedish flag and proving that we were a force to be reckoned with, and basically, the ship was top-heavy, and so it went 300 or so yards and sank.
I think December has always been the most haunted month, from the gothic-narrative point of view - a lot of Edgar Allan Poe stories are set in December. It's the last month of the year, and it's supposed to be sort of this mystical, spiritual month. And being Swedish, December is also the darkest month out of the year.
I'm constantly embarrassed at the level of attention actors get and the level of money that we get. It's completely disproportionate. I think you have to feel guilty about it. I think it makes you a better person to keep reminding yourself.
Until your mid-twenties, you're still growing up mentally. It's fair to say there's a bigger difference between twenty and twenty-five than between twenty-five and forty in terms of who you are, how you relate to your work, and what you want out of it.
When I read a script and have my first interaction with this character, do I feel like there's something I'm gonna' learn here? If I feel like it's something I've done before, then what's the incentive for me to do it?
I don't think I would ever be a doctor, but the reason I majored in science was because you could become a civil engineer, you could become a biologist, you could become a computer scientist - that was the point of it. I had no idea what I wanted to do. In my last two years of high school here happened to be these few scripts that I really responded to. Eventually, I landed the job, and that was something that I felt transcended whatever other people would think of me.
I feel like I'm the best actor on the planet and I also feel like I'm a fraud. I think hubris comes from insecurity. Confidence comes in a more rooted sense; part of being confident is being able to say, "I can be really shitty," and to accept that. But also not to crumble under it.
I miss being in my home country; here, I'm always a foreigner. America is, of course, built of people who are not from here. But going home, even just landing at Arlanda, the Stockholm airport, I think, "This is where I'm from. These people are my people."
It's funny: it takes a while to really get your character. It's impossible to do it on the first day. That's the same way in films; if you start shooting a film, maybe a couple weeks in, you're like, "Ah! Now I think I really get him."
It's not about being proud of Sweden; it's just a sense of belonging. Even if you've lived in a place for a long time, those first formative years are going to be a part of you forever, and it's something you can't replace.
