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" The role of my agent has just been to get me in the room. If I can get in the room - say the character is just a charming man who lives next door - then I'll walk in there and be as charming as I can and they will think to themselves, 'I don't see why we can't cast him.' "

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" Now there are certain things you have to prepare - like dialect and special skills. But in the moment, interaction between two characters on the page doesn't need - for me, I don't need to prepare that. "

Idris Elba

Special

Page

" What really excites me in a project is when it goes in a way you haven't been before. "

Idris Elba

Way

Before

" I love bikes. I used to own one, but I fell off it when I was younger and that was the end of my bike riding days until now. "

" There's a fast-track if you can do the networking. For some personalities it works, but for mine it doesn't. "

" I was cast in 'Thor' and I'm cast as a Nordic god. If you know anything about the Nords, they don't look like me but there you go. I think that's a sign of the times for the future. I think we will see multi-level casting. I think we will see that, and I think that's good. "

Idris Elba

Future

Think

" I was into Spider Man when I was a kid and that was the only comic I've ever read. "

" I was always a real athletic kid. Then when I got older, I just figured it was part of life to keep training. "

" I'm rebelling against being handed a career, like, 'You're the next this; you're the next that.' I'm not the next anything, I'm the first me. I can't be myself, I can't just be Idris Elba. But that's just the nature of the business. "

Idris Elba

Business

You

" There has been a big debate about it: can a black man play a Nordic character? "

" It's really funny because the same people who loved me as Stringer Bell were the same people that were watching 'Daddy's Little Girls' literally in tears. "

Idris Elba

Funny

Little Girls

" You know, film is the ultimate goal in an actor's career. I mean, I still love TV. I have my feet firmly stamped in it. But my opportunities have been bigger and better. "

" Because I was big, I didn't have to listen to anyone doubting me. I was just considered good at football or whatever, there were no questions about it. "

Idris Elba

Good

Questions

" It was deeply important for me to understand where Mandela came from. Because we know where he was going, and that's a famous story, but who was he? Where did he come from? What was his upbringing? "

Idris Elba

Important

Famous

" I still sing on bits and pieces. Singing's something that I love to do, but it's not something that I pursue as a career. "

" I did a rendition of 'Billie Jean' which is on my Soundcloud. I put it on Twitter, and it got about 3000 hits that day. "

" It's weird because my parents don't really understand my business. I get fan mail all day long, but if a piece happens to get to their house, they're like, 'Oh, my God, you've got a fan! You have to write them back. You have to do it!' "

" If you are going to call a film a 'black film' then you have to make a film that represents everyone that's black, which is almost impossible. That is why white films are not called white films, they are just called 'films.' "

" You watch yourself age and it's hard to feel like a sex symbol. "

" I think there's a tendency for actors like myself, and I don't mean to generalize myself, but I've played 'men's men,' if you will, characters that are simmering rage and calculated. There's a trend not to play anything that is opposed to that. "

" I was on a well-beaten path of actors - what we all call 'the Law and Order route'. I spent two years of auditioning for everything... and then 'The Wire' came up. "

" The less I talk about being black, the better. "

" I don't have a place that I call home at the moment because there's no point. I mean, I'm a traveling circus for a while. It's weird. Like, if I wanted to go home, there's nowhere to go. I just go to a hotel. But I've kind of gotten used to it. "

" I'd rather a young black actor read about success as opposed to how tough it was. I get these roles because I can act and that's it. Hopefully that's it. "

" I've always been DJing; it's just I'm making more of a push for it, making it more public. "

Idris Elba

Just

Public

" I'm not interested in making all-black films - I come from a very diverse culture; I want to work with every type of person. I work a lot with women executives because they seem to be a lot more open minded about that and a lot more progressive in that way. "

" It's actually quite criminal how 'The Wire' was systematically ignored. "

" I tend to stay away from the comics. "

" Are there differences between black actors' opportunities and white actors' opportunities? Yes, there are. It's been said. "

" There's the argument that you can relate to someone who's completely unrelatable. In the way that a director shows you his imagination on a film, then I get to show you my imagination in a big dumb character. "

" I don't get recognised that much yet in London, but when I do I get a real sense of achievement. "