Love Quote by Basil Rathbone

It is, on the surface, an actor talking shop. Underneath, Basil Rathbone is revealing a tension that defined early 20th-century stardom: the split between prestige and popularity, between the stage as craft and the screen as commodity. “Crave” is doing the heavy lifting here. It’s not “want” or “plan,” but an appetite, almost a withdrawal symptom. Shakespeare isn’t framed as a duty or a résumé line; it’s the thing that restores him.

Rathbone’s mention of “Shakespeare again” hints at a career rhythm familiar to actors who become widely recognizable: film work pays, travels, and cements an image, while returning to classical theatre functions like recalibration. For Rathbone, forever associated with sophisticated villains and, most famously, Sherlock Holmes, Shakespeare offered a way out of typecasting without saying so directly.

Then he names Orlando, not Hamlet or Macbeth. That choice matters. Orlando in As You Like It is romantic, idealistic, and physically expressive - a role that lets an actor be open-hearted rather than sharp-edged. Saying he “knows and loves” playing Orlando signals comfort and identity, as if the role is less performance than home base. It’s also a quiet flex: Shakespeare as a language Rathbone is fluent in, not intimidated by.

The line reads like nostalgia, but it’s also strategy. By professing love for the classical stage, Rathbone claims artistic seriousness while staying emotionally accessible. He’s telling you stardom is loud; craft is the place he can hear himself think.