>> from our studios in new york city, this is "charlie rose." charlie: his role in 12 years a slave and academy award nomination in 2014 for best actor. the stars in the post-apocalyptic drama z for zachariah. here is a clip of the film.

>> i haven't seen anyone alive for over a year. they told us you can't leave the valley. as long as we stay here, we would be protected. [screaming] get out of there! you need to get out of the water, please. the water is contaminated. >> there's got to be an exclamation. >> is just crazy that it still here. >> ran out of gas. >> we can get it to work manually. >> it works! are you thinking long-term for

us? >> it's ok. [dog barking] i mean you no harm, man. my name's caleb. >> hey! no, it's all right. >> that could be anybody for all we know. because we have faith. was the plan? i've seen the way you look at each other. it you need to figure it out. >> jealousy doesn't suit you. >> i love you.

charlie: welcome. ejiofor: good to see you. charlie: tell me who john loomis is. ejiofor: a scientist who works in one of the bits, in the trailer there. you see him in this hazmat suit. it's one of the things he's been working on is a prototype. he's been working on it ever since the nuclear event. it killed him. .e's trying to survive he has his wagon and he's moving around from place to base. across a valley that is fertile and luscious. it has been untouched because of the geographical components.

patterns have allowed it to be free of nuclear fallout. they are the only two people left. he's a very heady guy. leading with his head, he decides he's not going to rush into a relationship with her and try to establish this kind of friendship. the last thing he wants to do is get into a bad relationship with the last woman on earth. and how has the apocalypse changed him? ejiofor: i think there is an element of ptsd. there are issues that he had before. the things that he has seen and the things that he has done is the kind of strong wife we were working with. , when these us

people have interpersonal relationships, they start to dramatically escalate. all of these elements of character. charlie: after the success of "12 years a slave," did you try to be careful about what you are doing or did you look for good projects? nothing had changed other than you were better-known? >> i think that is what happened. i was constantly in the search for interesting projects. there was a lot to do with, a lot to bring. charlie: did you see more? ejiofor: yes and no. more projects, but the specifics -- charlie: not many good projects? ejiofor: the requirements that i have are complex.

they are hard to explain. charlie: why are they hard to explain? slightly, in are sense, abstract. it's a feeling or a tone. something that might appeal to me might seem a strange choice. agente: as opposed to the standpoint. ejiofor: any combination. charlie: and it's a feeling. ejiofor: it is a pull towards. something you have to say in. that you are intrigued by. a color or tone. in the end, that is something that is important. charlie: i would think that is easy in 12 years a slave. easy. something you might want to do. what is it here? ejiofor: a number of things. i have been interested into

handers and three handers. .hey are quite rare but they are interesting. to separate everything else away and see the kind of interpersonal dramatic relationships. a very small number of people can create the same tensions and dramatic tensions. there are no archetypal characters in this. there is no real sort of bad guy in the sense. if they are in between. things like jealousy and the like are as prevalent with three as it is with 6 million. ejiofor: and that was the real distinction for me. something i found was really important in this film. it distinction between two people and three is massive. with two people, everything else falls apart. it's sort of like they have differences, in terms of their

faith. loomis is atheist. anne is not. irrelevant. it has no political weight in their relationship. charlie: does he see her from the beginning as someone he falls in love with or as someone he's obligated to have a relationship with because of his commitment to the rest of the world? ejiofor: he sees that she is a beautiful girl. it's not possible for him to ofe away this sense of fear moving into a relationship sort of headlong. it can have serious implications and problems if it goes wrong. her attractiveness is irrelevant. toy need to find a way

understand in the capacity of a friend before taking that into any kind of romance or any kind of other realm. charlie: is this a modern-day biblical tale? ejiofor: it is like adamant eve, but for real. the actual underlying complications within this kind of construct. the beautiful countryside of new zealand. you are trying to organize a relationship. it has that kind of external pressure. it has serious ramifications. process, every word out of your mouth has to be weighed because you don't want to send the wrong signals.

so there are all of these choices. they are pressured. she is much younger and he is introducing technological things back into the universe. paternalistiching about their relationship. for all of those reasons, he is taking it very easy. all of which turns out to be a terrible idea because he's not the last man on earth. he's the second to last man on earth. when caleb arrives. he is an alpha male as well. it completely destroys all of these best laid lands -- plans. charlie: which makes an interesting film. ejiofor: absolutely. it becomes a question of youousies, and how do silently fight this kind of situation?

you do it through manipulation if you can. you do it by trying to outmaneuver the other guy. you do it through every kind of means that you have in your disposal. he finds himself, equally, a minority. which is irrelevant if it is the two of them. but racially and in terms of religion, he is minorit ized which creates a system of self-consciousness. charlie: how has he changed by the end of the film? ejiofor: all the way through the film, the distinction between who loomis believes he is and who he actually is gets increasingly wider. as he is having to justify all of these decisions and actions that lead him down a path. if you talk to him at the beginning of the film or even the beginning of the nuclear

event, where he ends up is not a place you would think is conceivable for him. he is a moral human being. a man of reason. within a certain sequence of circumstances, he is forcing himself to justify, more and more, the unethical and immoral acts. charlie: where are your stage ambitions? ejiofor: i am on stage the national theater. they are doing "every man." break.a brief it then i come back and finish my show. i'm almost at the end of it and it has been an extraordinary time. it is a 15th century morality duffyp aided by caroline and directed by the new artistic

director of the national theater. it has been an incredible process. , for me, an exceptional show. charlie: how are you growing as an actor other than you growing as a human being? ejiofor: that's an interesting question. i feel like it happens concurrently. i definitely feel like doing a play like "every man," and trying to get into the moral and ethical complexities of this time, and what a morality play means for us now -- environmental concerns and our self-centeredness as well. it is something that i feel like, by the end the play, it is something that has made me, in some ways, a better person. it is a great gift. charlie: it has influenced the

humanity of you. ejiofor: that's not something i necessarily look for. but that it is something that is happening is a very deeply gratifying. ,aking films like these zechariah, and the plays like every man, to flesh out the nuances of it makes me a better actor. that is always going to be the goal. to keep on improving my work to the point that i am satisfied. charlie: who has had the most influence on you as a director? ejiofor: in theater? i theater, i would say that had the extraordinary opportunity to work with michael greenwich a effew times. i worked with him before doing -- i've always had a remarkable time working with him.

for me, he has a great way of speaking to actors and of guiding a piece. charlie: do you know what that is or do you just know it happens? ejiofor: i think it starts with a great overview of the piece. and a very watchful eye. and the skill is to be able to niger production and niger performance very gently along a certain way which opens up the actors for the audience. that whole kind of area. he is somebody that understands that is what the audience is looking for. every man was, for me, just over five weeks. the company was rehearsing for longer. i was making a film so i came into it. charlie: when does that come out? ejiofor: this year.

november. charlie: what is the satisfaction of acting for you? ejiofor: i think there is something about it which is, to me, and artform. this is something that i wanted to get to the root of. it is always a form of self expression. i can express myself artistically. and never having to do it as myself was a great advantage. singing,e painting or dancing even, you are so much more exposed. musicians are so exposed. poets are exposed. writers, obviously.

you can kind of be concealed. i imagine it would have been writing. i have a very deep connection to literature from when i was growing up. and in some form, i would have moved into part of that. plays, i about reading decided that i wanted to see what the structure and the form were meant to be shown. -- i got the bug. charlie: if you had had -- i thought this -- instruction. the more you understand the construct of the play, the more you understand what goes into it . i think, the more you appreciate it. the more you know about art, the more you appreciate the artist.

it doesn't mean you can't enjoy it and you can't enjoy it on some level of spontaneity, but ,he more you can find connecting with how it affects your life were finding parallels -- at the same time, the more you know about what goes into, and how difficult it is, does it make it good? ejiofor: that is very true. playt to see, recently, a othello. for and having such an intimate knowledge of the play, a word for word knowledge, it is always great for me to see that play and see what choices people are making. to see what they are doing. how they are doing it. how it affects the rest of the play and the audience.

where they've hit with the humor, where they lost it. it's a fascinating thing to do. charlie: we both talked about being in london and seeing benedict cumberbatch and hamlet. of because of the number years i've been on the air with this program, 25 years, we've had a remarkable group of actors that have acted has hamlet -- as hamlet. it has been a defining experience for them. to take those different performances. you understand a bit about the craft of acting and playwriting. if you can take a play and see it done in so many different ways, all true to the text, but at the same time, understanding the creative imagination that goes into -- ejiofor: especially hamlet. charlie: most of all, hamlet.

ejiofor: it is difficult. it is so well known. it is hard to, kind of -- it is surprising. outdoor hamletnd that was an amateur production in oxford. the production was actually rained off because they could not do the last fight scene. it was too slippery and too dangerous. halfway through, for the first time, i caught the emotional wind of hamlet. it really shocked me. i had been familiar with it for years. charlie: how many times have you done it? ejiofor: never done it. charlie: never once? ejiofor: i have been asked to do it on different occasions. charlie: why had he said no? i do not knowse that i fully understand hamlet in theater, is my admission. and because of that, i never

really found myself totally capable of being inside the play. charlie: what is it you not understand? ejiofor: their dynamic. their relationship. charlie: unless you understand that, you don't think you could. ejiofor: it has made it hard for me to understand the dynamics. suicide, the relationship. how he treats her. i have read extensively about it. i have never been able to sit with it the way i have been able to sit with other -- charlie: there are people here that really don't do shakespeare that are very good actors. bill nighy. he has no interest in shakespeare. i can't imagine you won't do hamlet. can have a life without it, obviously.

i'm not saying you have to do it to be happy or fulfilled. but you are so good -- ejiofor: i would love to find a way of really connecting. i haven't yet. but the penny might well drop. have read it through and have been really happy. and reaching a certain point. what is this? ejiofor: let's take -- charlie: let's take the film role. see for zachariah. did you have to understand him? did you have to see and understand the relationship he had? i think you have to understand and imagine yourself there. there is a lot of work to do once that happens. there are a lot of dynamics and nuances to flesh out. but of all the basic dynamics in place, if i get it, i can get on the train, at least.

charlie: what is the worst decision you have ever made? ejiofor: the worst career decision i have made. charlie: either by omission or commission. ejiofor: i suppose, in the end, there are a number of different pathways. charlie: and you can't really tell if you took this you might not have seen this. ejiofor: i mean, the clearest indication of that was, for me, a decision i don't think was a -- it did notut seem like a decision that would likely have a good and. that was after i did amistad. i was young. i decided not to stay in hollywood. the theater career. at that point, i assumed i would be doing theater.

didn't envision possibly having a film career. even though i had just worked [laughter]rg -- it struck me that was a mistake. andarted to try to do films do films in los angeles. i don't know. i think my decision to go back to london also influenced my -- and to go back to the theater is why i met bill nighy, and i met others and did things. there is no part of it that is cut and dry. there are so many different little avenues. i could drive myself out. ejiofor: it's been great having -- charlie: it's been great having you here. ejiofor: it's been a pleasure. inrlie: the movie premieres

theaters on friday, august 28 and v.o.d. -- thank youhere for being here. ♪

charlie: alta chi know is here and is an oscar, tony, and emmy award-winning actor. it was once said of him, some actors lay characters. alta chino becomes them. here is a look -- out tal

pacino becomes them. here's a look at some of them. >> i love you. i was going to go out and score for you. -- i reality is, we just don't care if i am in trouble or who gets it anymore. if we have to go to outside agencies -- where are we going to go? where am i going to go? i know it was you, fredo. you broke my heart. you broke my heart. get back there, man. he wants to kill me so bad, he can taste it. attica! attica! you want to play rough? ok. friend!o to my little

you want to learn the first rule you would know if you ever's and spent a your life -- day in your life. never open your mouth until you know what the shot is. boys is a time i have seen like these, younger than these, their arms torn out, their legs ripped off. thethere is nothing like site of an amputated spirit. there is no prosthetic for that. if it's between you and some poor bastard whose wife you are going to turn into a widow, rather, you are going down. scientist. the top he is a corporate officer.

insider is the ultimate . he's got something to say, i want him on 60 minutes. you think about this career in acting that you have had and continue to have? you know, you spend your life just moving on. it is one of the perks. and also one of the issues you have when you're with a group of people. and you know, you all sort of feel that way. actors are transient. charlie: somebody said all actors are gypsies. pacino: they are. they have that in their spirit. when i look at things i've done is a merciful distance you have and you look at it and say, it's all part of -- if you want to call it

development. remember there was a special evening and they showed old movies they did. how am i still walking around? remember once they did one for me. i never was in rehab. charlie: the question posed, stay true to yourself. you stay true to yourself, for the most part, haven't you? pacino: i guess so. here and there. i've feared off. -- i't make those kind of don't think of myself as that at all. being true to myself. . can feel when i'm not i can feel when i've gone off

the track. lifeie: in your personal or the performance? pacino: both. it is random for me. world,ives all over the the access in my life and my world. shouldn'tsay that you read tolstoy until your 30. until you understand it. >> you should not do hamlet until you are at least 40. except you've got to do hamlet earlier because you won't do it if you wait. you know it's impossible. the best ring is to get in there. i love when the young actors do it. i never did it. i never felt like i was right to it. i never did it. like i existed in

that play. older, i willt understand it more. there is a question of understanding it. that is the separation. it was hamlet and somebody having you do a reading. al: it was strasburg. i was afraid to do anything. i was very young. i got to the actor's studio a young age. i would stand around and watch them and i would go home. throughout my life, i have committed to memory certain monologues that i like. charlie: you were almost a teenager? al: early 20's. i thought, gee, i have these great monologues in me. a great eugene o'neill monologue. and i had the wonderful -- what a peasant slave am i.

i had them committed to my mind. i went for the first time. i was sitting there for six months. finally, i got up the nerve to sign up. lee strasburg lifts the paper and he was able to pronounce my name. al pacino. most people said "pakeeny." he said, al pacino? what's this? "hamlet," and "the iceman cometh." he said ok, you know, we take all kinds in here. [laughter] i got up there and i did a ferocious peasant. and i went wild with the eugene o'neil -- and i was really giving it the old gung ho. stepping on the gas and stuff. it wasn't that good. it was over and he was looking at me and the audience got kind of teary about it.

it had a lot of commitment and energy. he said, here's what i would like you to do. immediately, this was the genius with him. he said, i want you to do i want you to do hamlet as hickey from "teh iceman cometh" and hickey as hamlet. i immediately went into it. he was very happy about that. i did not pause. i just switched it. charlie: the character of hamlet and the text of hickey. al: yes. and the text of hamlet and -- charlie: and hickey as the presence he had. al: i learned more that day than i had in my entire life. charlie: and how have you managed to be a star to this day not playing character roles as much as you are playing stars? you are the center of these two films. pacino: again, i am going by

what i am feeling. you know, some movies i have made that were not character driven, i don't know. it's a mystery to me. talkingy that i'm here to you and that i'm still doing this thing. i started early, too, as an actor. i was in a play in the new york, and i got an award for that year. it was faye dunaway who saw me in this and told the great producer marty bergman. that play, there was something in that play.

it hits real hard. it is a beautiful play. john lasalle was in it, too. and i had been acting maybe 10 years before that. i was quite young, my mid-20's. it started this along. i did feel, oddly enough, as an explorer in my work in a way, experimenting and trying to learn more about the classics and myself. i got a lot of joy out of that. i was at a place in the actor's gallery down in soho which no one could even find in those days. and then to be lauded in a way, suddenly, everything upped the stakes. the star thing came in. the title came in. somehow i was trying to preserve

something. i thought i understood earlier on because i then found myself in another world. i liked. i thought it was a good thing. i still think it was a good thing. it was a lucky thing. things happen that way. there was a -- maybe something happened that was a new kind of person. it was not comparable to things other people were seeing. they came out of the 1960's, came out of this time in america where people like me were given an opportunity or whatever. i don't know. it was a combination of things. i remember one time, i did a scene one time, charlie, we had this scene in the studio. i will never forget this because i saw him on his deathbed, and i said, charlie, remember the time

when they were doing this big thing and i was one of the seams in the school and every teacher brought their student that they wanted to show how they were doing there. i went into this thing and i did this scene. i said, remember when i came to see you, charlie, grabbed me and said, good stuff. good stuff. and the teacher got up. and went crazy against me. they thought it was the worst. it was like, who do you think you are? luther adler? you come up here and do this. what is this about? i told charlie in the hospital, in the hospital, do you remember that time? he said, yeah. what was that? why did he get so upset? he said, he saw a new era.

i thought that, in some way, i think it's very dramatic to hear that when charlie says, i don't know if it true. but i do know it was interesting because that was happening. it happens today something comes along and you get used to it. in the old days, actors have to pronounce things a certain way. to be seen in the audience. i don't mean to compare myself to people. i was always reading books about actors. and edwin came at a time when he came from a whole other climate. a whole other world. there is something about the roles i played in this situation and the times we are in and i

got lucky. and it's been this thing all my life. everybody says it, but it's true. i remember saying wants to someone, we are all together and actors. i'm no better than anybody else. i have seen people do such great stuff. at the same time, you're doing so well. a few years into it. what is it? why you? why not me? all this stuff, you wanted it. i said, you you wanted it, i think i had to have it.

charlie: oh, wow. pacino: that is an interesting distinction. i don't know. --ust think that charlie: you had to have it. pacino: i never thought it would turn into this naturally. time.knew it was my then i would be seen. and enough had happened -- yourt in this play know, i went up to boston and i did three plays. i went to do a part in a play. i got up and did it. they said you were going to be great in it. it was not good at all. as a matter of fact, i remember i was in the dressing room.

somebody came down. i heard it on the speaker. my entrance was coming up. and this guy in the dressing room was really excited by this review of the play we were doing. i said, what is that? he tried to cover it. why is he covering it? i said, can i see that can i see that? he said, yeah, here. he pushed it over to me. i looked at it and it was a great review. this person, that person, how great. with one exception. [laughter] it was al pacino in the role, it was terrible. as i was reading it, my cue came on and i had to go on stage. i had to perform after reading that in the play he was criticizing. but i laughed. i think at a certain time the ability to look at something like that and laugh, it might have helped me a little bit. i don't know. it hurt. another part that i did not want to do i was ok in.

it was always the question of, what do we do? you walk along the street, you see a certain tree. you either take a picture or you get the canvas out or you painted. you never know what is going to happen when you read a script. and with actors, if you don't try it, you are not going to know. what happens is if you start to censor yourself, i think when you start to censor yourself a gets a little -- because we don't know. charlie: thank you for coming. a great pleasure. ♪

charlie: helen mirren is here and she is an academy award-winning actor. she became a dame of the british empire. she stars on broadway as the queen. the play is called an audience. it is a private conversation queen elizabeth had it with her prime ministers over the last 60 years. the associated press calls it a touching portrait of power and majesty. >> goodness, no. no, no. there is a photograph of me taken outside downing street. some people interpret it as such. there was never any scheme or plan.

the three children where i grew up never had any boots nor shoes to their feet. they were clubs because they lasted longer. as children, we never had any dreams or hoax the on survival. i nearly died of typhoid. mirren: i bet she is proud. >> she is furious. doesn't care for the limelight or the thrust of westminster. certainly doesn't care for our new home. living in the office, she calls it. mirren: my husband feels the same way about this place. we all do, actually. charlie>> no. mirren: yes. >> water? charlie: when peter morgan calls

you -- peter, who you know. mirren: he didn't call me. he e-mailed me. he said, i've written a play and i would like you to look at it. i e-mailed back to words. "you bastard." i knew he knew. i knew that he knew, in the end, i would have to do it. i was so cross. charlie: you said no, and then you said yes. you saw them in a room -- doldry,i saw stephen one of the greatest directors and european theater. i saw bob crowley. one of the top designers and european theater. i saw robert foxe. i said, don't be ridiculous. you will never get to do this again. charlie: is it easy or more

-- and you knew peter is it easyrevious -- to play her on film or on stage? this was very different -- mirren: this was very different. the first time i had done it or anybody had done it on that scale. of it weretions terrifying about how it might be flak weed and what w might receive. now we know those things are accepted and we know about it. maybe, in a way, in the film, it would be a different animal. that is tough and difficult challenge.

give got to have that kind of work. charlie: let's talk about with the play is about. mirren: she needs for 15 minutes, no longer. just to know what is going on politically. but neither the queen nor the prime minister's ever talk about what they talked about. and there is no one else in the room. it is completely and utterly private and is one of the few places that either of them can .eel utterly secure charlie: so peter had to imagine. mirren: peter imagines everything.

but the only thing the prime ministers have said is that they felt they could say things to the queen that they could not say to anyone else because she is in a position of knowledge. and at the same time, she's got to keep her mouth shut. for some of them, she became kind of a shrink. charlie: you see her going from churchill to cameron. she was 26? churchill was a friend of the royal family. mirren: absolutely. and through the war and everything. charlie: her attitude had to be a certain sense of awe. mirren: yes. she was the queen. yes, of course. that early scene where she is young and does not know what she's doing. he is training her up, if you like. i love that scene.

look at then you career you have had, would you have had it any different? would you like more early? mirren: yes. -- youtunately hit really want to talk about me, charlie. do you? yes.n: yes -- charlie: as much as you may not want to. in my goldeni was era between 27 and 37, which is a great era in anyone's life, male or female. you are at the top of your game and beginning to be wiser. it was a very bad time for british film. confessions of a window cleaner. just awful. it wasn't until i came to america -- prime suspect. charlie: something like 14 million viewers in london, prime

suspect. mirren: i had done a lot of very good tv at that point. charlie: you would like to have more film roles early? you could be, essentially, notwithstanding however old you are -- you work all the time. yes, i do.en: charlie: you are in the prime of your career. mirren: i have gone between tv and theater. for ae: you can be prime long time. but it is good as it has been. mirren: absolutely. definitely. to be starring on broadway is fabulous. so great. charlie: let's good about it? mirren: that thing about seeing your name in lights. it's pathetic. but it's great. and all the people. amazing. my sister and i -- charlie: even now, you get

excited about things like that? mirren: definitely. it's fantastic. charlie: did you say your greatest guru was francis bacon? mirren: yes. charlie: how did he influence you? mirren: he was a great painter. obviously. there is a book called "interviews with francis bacon. " at the time, i had not thought of the tension between inspiration and technique. and the way accident is very important in art. but you can only achieve way after youfull have fully mastered technique. it's true. seven,n under the age of every single one of them is a genius painter because it is

totally instinctive. but you can be paid in -- painting like a seven-year-old when you're 14. you go for this painful process of learning technique. you have lost all instinct and inspiration. you are just learning how to draw. and then you get through that. can allow accident to happen. it you are open to accident. you have all the technique. you have all that -- so deep within you, you don't even have to think about it. it has to become thoughtless, the technique. and then you can allow inspiration to come back. charlie: thank you for coming. mirren: thank you, charlie. brilliant. ♪

♪ emily: it has changed the way we watch video, redefined going viral, challenged governments, and even launched the career of justin bieber. today, youtube, now owned by google, has more than 1 billion users, uploading 300 hours of video every minute. it all started a decade ago with a trip to the zoo. and one of the founders says he is not quite done changing the way we are entertained. joining me today on "studio 1.0," youtube cofounder and former ceo, chad hurley. chad, thank you so much for being here. it is so great to have you.