Bill Nighy reveals stealing books for drama school audition

Actor Bill Nighy disclosed that he took the complete works of William Shakespeare from a library without permission to prepare for his drama school audition. The Oscar-nominated star explained that he applied to the Guildford School of Acting primarily to impress a girl, but the audition required him to prepare two pieces: one from a modern playwright and another from Shakespeare. Speaking on BBC Radio 4’s This Cultural Life, Nighy recounted that he and an older friend “stole the complete works of Shakespeare, and we stole the complete works of George Bernard Shaw which we thought was sort of modern.” The 74-year-old actor commented, “We could have borrowed it like everybody else, but for some reason, we were sort of developing a criminal mentality.” Nighy mentioned that he unintentionally memorized two female roles for the audition while “down the pub” with his friend. He performed the role of Eliza Doolittle from Shaw’s play Pygmalion, and the part of Cesario in Twelfth Night, not realizing that Cesario was the female character Viola disguised in male clothing. Although the audition panel appeared “a bit confused” by his interpretation of the brief, Nighy stated he received a callback “with more suitable material.” Subsequently, he gained admission to the drama school. Nighy revealed that the girl he sought to impress had initially written a letter to the drama school to secure an audition. He confessed, “She could have said astronaut and I would have given it a shot.” Throughout his career, which included an Oscar nomination last year for his performance in Living, Nighy has professionally acted in two Shakespearean plays. These were The Taming Of The Shrew at the Gateway Theatre in Chester, and King Lear alongside Sir Anthony Hopkins at the National Theatre in London. He informed BBC Radio 4, “I retired from Shakespeare sometime after that… nobody took a blind bit of notice, but I just thought, ‘I can’t go through this any more because I don’t have any particular interest in the delivery of Shakespeare’.” He added, “I understand he’s the greatest poet the world has ever known, but the performance of it, I will leave to other people.”