When actor Bryan Cranston was first offered the role of Walter White, he was hesitant to take it on, feeling that the character’s drive to change his life completely would be too difficult to understand or relate to. He changed his mind after reading Vince Gilligan’s outline of the show and realizing that the success of Breaking Bad depended entirely on how he played the character – with Cranston saying Walter White was this guy who got up every day, put his pants on one leg at a time like I do, had bills to pay like I do. What happened next? Breaking Bad – Bryan Cranston’s worst-case scenario
It wasn’t about the money. It was about the fact that I felt powerless as a fifty-year-old man. I had hit rock bottom
I was 50 years old, and I’d been fired from a TV show (Malcolm in the Middle). I felt like I had no control over my life. Like it was slipping away—and fast. And then along came Breaking Bad, which gave me an out: Walter White taught me how to be in charge of my own destiny again.
I did everything I could physically do not to get sick… I studied them carefully so I wouldn’t get them
I washed my hands all the time, I ate carefully, I didn’t do things that would compromise my immune system, and I exercised. I was focused on looking healthy because I was afraid that if they saw me sick they wouldn’t want to hire me. All of these were strategies to put my physical self into a place where I could pass for someone who had health.
When people have issues in their lives they can see someone or something else as the source of their problems
I am not happy because my wife doesn’t love me anymore. I am broke because of President Obama. I can’t find a job because of illegal immigrants. But if you really want to overcome these challenges, it is crucial that you understand they are a result of bad decisions you have made in your own life. You need to acknowledge and accept responsibility for your actions and stop blaming other people or situations for your problems. If you continue to do so, there is little chance that things will improve.
I really did think it was never going to end… This series will never run out of story lines
it was entertaining to watch how Walt progressed from a teacher, who was just trying to provide for his family and make money so that he could keep up with his lifestyle and provide for his family. It all starts out as a nice story but soon turns into one where Walt has lost his morals, values and respect. He is now seen as an addict who doesn’t care about anyone anymore except himself – a man whose life revolves around meth.
What it ultimately became was a study of a man who transforms himself from Mr. Chips into Scarface.
As Walter White says in Breaking Bad: I am not in danger, I am the danger. A guy opens his door and gets shot, and you think that of me? No! I am the one who knocks! It could be argued that he is ultimately a victim of his own cancer (that disease will do strange things to people), but he was never going to live forever with or without it.
There are plenty of myths about the writing process, he says. If you go into it thinking, ‘I’m writing Hamlet,’ you’re going to fail miserably.
After Bryan Cranston won a Tony for his performance in All The Way and then was given an Emmy for his work on Breaking Bad, he thinks that people see him as some kind of method actor, transforming himself physically and mentally to inhabit a role. (Here, he plays Walter White in Breaking Bad.) But any good actor has tricks up their sleeve—and for Cranston, breaking bad is no exception.
