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| Gabriel James Byrne was born in Dublin, Ireland on May 12th 1950. He was first of six born to a nurse and a Guinness barrel maker, at the age of twelve he moved to England to become a priest. After four years of the Priesthood he was expelled and so returned to Ireland. Byrne studied Archaeology, Languages and Phonetics, at University College Dublin and didn't embark on his acting career until the tender age of 28. After being in the TV series 'The Riordans' and then staring in his own spin-off series called 'Bracken', made his way to America. The role garnered Byrne fame in Ireland, and ensured that the adjective "brooding" would always precede his name. Director John Boorman cast him in a supporting role in Excalibur, this was Bryrne's first feature film. In1986, he went to work playing a Spanish trapeze artist in Siesta, and fell in love with his co-star, Ellen Barkin, whom he married a year later. The couple divorced in 1993 and shared custody of their two children, Jack and Romey Marion. The ironic aspect of two of Byrne's biggest staring roles i.e. 'End of Days' and 'Stigmata', are that he plays Satan and a Priest respectively - an indication of the dark and light sides of his characters. Currently, Byrne is directing, writing and producing as well as acting.
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Eye color: Saphire Blue |
Height:
5' 10" (1.78 m) |
Zodiac: Taurus |
| Education: Dublin University | | |
Resides in:
New York, USA & Dublin, Ireland |
On Catholicism: The elimination of guilt is one of the biggest battles I have to wage with myself." |
Family Ellen Barkin(18 September 1988-1999 divorced 2 Children Daughter: Romy Marion Byrne, born on November 18, 19192
Son: Jack Daniel Byrne, born in October 1989
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Books
Autobiography titled "Pictures in my Head"
The Woman who Danced with JFK
Tales of Ancient Ireland |
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Awards:
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Before becoming an actor, he was an archaeologist, schoolteacher, short-order cook, bullfighter and he worked in a teddy bear place. |
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On his profession and success:
"People who believe that being incredibly famous or wealthy or powerful is going to make them happier are on a fool's mission. I'm famous enough, that suits me fine. The relentless emphasis on celebrity in this country drives me around the fucking bend. The new religion is celebrity, but nobody stops to question what it means when you achieve it. Honestly, I'm very scared of the whole notion of fame. You take it on at your own peril." Gabriel Byrne
| Interview:
I would like to break out of this "dark, brooding" image, cause I'm actually not like that at all. In Ireland, brooding is a term we use for hens. A brooding hen is supposed to lay eggs. Everytime somebody says "He's dark and brooding" I think: "He's about to lay an egg".
The truth is that actors don't really have any control over the end product. To think that you have control is a delusion and it's also incredibly frustrating to be investing that much hope into something that essentially boils down to marketing. So you try to do movies that you feel connected with and you work with directors and actors you admire.
I've always felt that acting is about exposure. You expose yourself in the choices you make. It's when you present yourself as truthfully as you can, in a given situation, that you are being that character. Even though you're being yourself.
Sometimes, the vanity of actors is that we imagine we're so completely different on screen from who we are in real life. When really, all actors play themselves.
 On American Movies:
American movies to me - and, I mean, I've said this before a million times - are becoming more and more homogeneous because the marketing objective - and marketing now plays such a major role in movies that it almost obliterates everything else - the marketing objective is the lowest common denominator. "You can't put that in; let's put the car chase, let's put the sex scene, let's put the fight in, let's get them back together, they end up happily, they walk off into the sun..." So that there's a formulaic predictability to American movies. That, allied with the cynicism of the way movies are put together - product placement and spin-offs and toys and all kinds of crap that, you know, have nothing to do with the telling of stories - they've turned American movies into McMovies. So that when the movie-goer gets his movie, it's like a hamburger: he doesn't want a piece of aubergine in there; he wants his onion, his tomato, his hamburger and his bun. And he doesn't want the bun hard, he wants it soft. And he wants it in two minutes. | | |
fullofsakuraflowersposted 99 days ago
