Andrew Scott
With thanks to Kathie Gray I offer the conversation below between a young actor who asked actor Andrew Scott how to develop their acting career in light of mental health challenges. The conversation occurred after a recent HUMEN charity event.
[Andrew Scott] I think we are in the embryonic stages of understanding mental health issues. There isn’t a person in this room or in this stadium, or this city, or this country, or in this world who hasn’t had at some stage encountered some sort of mental health issues. You are not on your own by any stretch of the imagination. I have had mental health issues in the past, and sometimes the weather is pretty stormy. But I think that if we can remember that it is weather that will change, and by its very nature has to change.
So you going for RADA (Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts, London, UK), maybe it will be a difficult year for you in the next year, but maybe it won’t. I think that all we can do is take it day by day. So don’t project what it’s going to be. It could be fantastic.
There [should be] no stigma attached to mental health, and I need to say how I have been so inspired by the courage and bravery of people I have met here at this conference who have spoken about their mental health issues, because I think that what connects us as people is our vulnerability. I think that when we go and meet people and say “I’m exhausted” or “I feel lousy,” if that’s the truth, people will respond to it. If we put up these constant guards, saying “I’m fantastic” you know, we live in the world of Facebook and Instagram and filters where we can be our own PR machine. It’s very easy to think that’s a reality for some people to think that we’re failing. We live in an age where we’re fooled by other people. We fool each other by getting rid of that spot, or filter the light there, or I’m gonna airbrush my life, and it becomes an advertisement rather than the way we really are; the way we really are is really vulnerable and sometimes really joyful. Great art can really reflect that. So when you go to RADA my advice to you or anybody who wants to participate in art is to tell the truth and find some way to bring who you are, and that is enough.
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Readers may wish to read more about Andrew Scott’s dramatic career here. Here’s an extract:
Irish actor Andrew Scott speaks about men’s mental health as he teams up with the HUMEN Charity’s Rise Against Suicide Sunrise Walk in the UK.
Andrew Scott doesn’t always play the kindest characters on-screen – he’s known for villainous roles such as Moriarty in Sherlock and Max Denbigh in Spectre – but that really couldn’t be further from real life.
The actor is generous with his time and his thoughts, despite calling from Italy where he’s currently working 12 hour days shooting a new project.
Scott, 45, says he considers mental health similar to the weather. “The weather is a changeable thing,” he says. “If you’re in the driving rain, there’s no point in screaming up at the sky saying, ‘Please stop raining, please stop raining’. The best thing you can do is just accept it’s raining, and know that it will stop.”
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