Helena Bonham Carter Quotes

“Be yourself. No one else can.”

“Because I sleep with him he asked me to audition, you know?”

“Fairytales have always got to have that scary quality, as long as you make them laugh.”

“Famous people come up to me, but I don't know who they are because my sight is so bad. It's always at the pool of the Four Seasons in Beverly Hills when I don't have my lenses in and my glasses are in my room.”

“For me, acting is about getting away from myself. So to look at myself is the last thing I want.”

“I also get fed up with the fact that casting agents and directors have this impression of me as being frail and petite. I find it very patronizing. I'm quite beefy and strong. I was a gymnast in school and I have lots of muscles.”

“I always feel better after a good scream.”

“I don't think kids have a problem with death. It's us older ones who are nearer to it, that start being frightened.”

“I drink booze, I smoke, and I'm hooked on caffeine. I actually have been known to swear at times and belch and even raise my voice when provoked. And I'm not physically repressed!”

“I enjoy those small chats you have when people come up and talk to you about your work. It only involves a few seconds of effort to be nice to those people, and I am very grateful for the kind words that people have taken the trouble to express to me in person.”

“I have to struggle to change people's perceptions of me. I grew very frustrated with the perception that I'm this shy, retiring, inhibited aristocratic creature when I'm absolutely not like that at all. I think I'm much more outgoing and exuberant than my image.”

“I just want to give you this one piece of advice: if you're standing and you could be sitting, sit. If you're sitting and you could be lying down, lie down.”

“I liked pretending to be other people: I could reinvent myself, reinvent my own reality.”

“I love changing what I look like because I always feel super strange whenever I do watch something that I'm in.”

“I love witches and magic and dress-up and make-believe.”

“I never really wanted to grow up. I grew up really young. I moved out when I was 13 – that's when I started acting.”

“I should get a few ribs taken out, because I'll be in a corset for the rest of my life.”

“I think everything in life is art. What you do. How you dress. The way you love someone, and how you talk. Your smile and your personality. What you believe in, and all your dreams. The way you drink your tea. How you decorate your home. Or party. Your grocery list. The food you make. How your writing looks. And the way you feel. Life is art.”

“I think I've still got a bit of a sad*-mas*chistic streak in me, because if I'm not going to be restricted by corsets and covered in lace, then I still wind up wearing an ape-mask over my face. I do wonder how I get myself in these situations!”

“I was like one of those nauseatingly nice children. I was very, very well behaved and boring.”

“I was weird right from the start. It's just that you can't ever expect people to get you. And I do think that really did mess with my head, being well-known young, when you really don't know who you are.”

“I'm a late developer. I only moved out of home when I was 13.”

“I'm always attracted to lower budget, not because it's lower budget, but because they tend to be better scripts.”

“I'm drawn to emotionally damaged characters because there is more to unlock.”

“I'm not dead and I don't have blue hair but some people say there are similarities. It is usually intolerable to watch myself onscreen but this time it's fine. I think it's beautiful and a real work of art.”

“I'm often criticised for what I wear. That's my main label in the press now: disastrous dresser!”

“I'm the kind of actor who has ventured into escaping from me.”

“I've got Tourette's, practically. I'll tell anyone anything.”

“I've never had white teeth. To be honest, I've never been told to do any of those horrible things – get your teeth whitened or your nose straightened.”

“I’ve aged, but I don’t think I’ve grown up.”