I’m fascinated by fire. When I was four, I wore an American fireman’s hat all the time, and I still have one in my office today. Glasgow used to be called ‘Tinderbox City;’ there were always fires, people getting killed. – Peter Capaldi
I hated improvisation because in my early days as an actor, improvisation meant somebody had just come down from Oxford and they were doing a play above a pub in Kentish Town, and the biggest ego would win. – Peter Capaldi
I never really think of acting and directing as being separate; they are just different expressions of the same thing. – Peter Capaldi
My adolescence was a kind of motorway pile-up. I wish I had known that one day the geek would inherit the Earth. – Peter Capaldi
My childhood growing up in that part of Glasgow always sounds like some kind of sub-Catherine Cookson novel of earthy working-class immigrant life, which to some extent it was, but it wasn’t really as colourful that. – Peter Capaldi
There are only a handful of really good TV programmes, and I’m blessed to be in one of them. – Peter Capaldi
What I’ve learnt being an actor is that you’ve got to be lucky. I got less lucky, and nobody was interested. If a part came up, it would be for the main corpse’s friend’s brother who was having problems with his marriage. – Peter Capaldi
The biggest thing I have realized was that you have to choose your collaborators very carefully, and that not everybody can like you. The process of filmmaking is so difficult, there’s no point in doing it unless you can do it the way you want. – Peter Capaldi
I don’t remember ‘Doctor Who’ not being part of my life, and it became a part of growing up, along with The Beatles, National Health spectacles, and fog. And it runs deep. It’s in my DNA. – Peter Capaldi
I’m creative. I can’t relax unless I’ve got some project on the go. I’m somebody from art school, and art school during the punk era, when you just had a go at whatever came along. – Peter Capaldi
I could never plan to have a career that went this well… you know, there were times when it didn’t: when it went into the toilet, or ducked, or was difficult to get moving. – Peter Capaldi
Scottish men of a certain age have a black response to almost everything as a measure of how sophisticated they are. I have a very long fuse that eventually explodes after building up a nice head of steam, although it’s only happened three times – usually at work when someone takes me for granted. – Peter Capaldi
If you travel in time and space, most of the people you know and love will eventually be gone. But you’ll also be able to go and find them again. – Peter Capaldi
The best advice is to get on with it. I’m very prone to falling into depressions – not clinical, just ‘can’t be bothered.’ It’s such a waste of time. – Peter Capaldi
You can’t, as an actor, conduct yourself by making constant references to other people. – Peter Capaldi
STG and the Ramshorn Theatre are a vital part of Glasgow’s rich cultural history. To abandon them now is to abandon not only our past, but our future. – Peter Capaldi
I know what ‘Doctor Who’ fans are like because I am a ‘Doctor Who’ fan myself. They’re good people. – Peter Capaldi
One of the problems with episodic television of any color is that everything has got to be okay at the end of the episode so it can start again next week. – Peter Capaldi
Maybe it’s because I’ve been an actor for such a long time, but I think, unless you’re a big star, you don’t really have much control over anything. I’ve never been able to make any plans. – Peter Capaldi
The difference between movies and TV is that in TV you have to have a trauma every week, but that event may not be the biggest event in the characters’ lives. – Peter Capaldi
I think it’s not misplaced in ‘Doctor Who’ to have someone who is little bit edgy and maybe a little volatile and dangerous. – Peter Capaldi
The only time I’ve tried to make plans, the cosmic sledgehammer has intervened and something else has happened. You just have to wait and see what comes your way, so that’s what I do. – Peter Capaldi