Harvey Keitel: ‘I’m so fatigued… my stutter has returned’

Harvey Keitel beat his stutter when he was young, but has started to see it return.

The 76-year-old actor beat his speech impediment originally when he was a little boy. But as he struggles with the fast pace of his life, Harvey has started to see it creep back in.

“When I was a little boy, I had a stutter. I still stutter, but much less, ” he told Britain’s Esquire magazine. “Back then it was a real champion stutter. In time it faded away, for the most part. Now it seems to be returning a little bit. Maybe because I’m so fatigued. I don’t mean just now, but in these years.”

Harvey opened up about the issue during a question and answer session with the publication. He also explained that despite his advancing age, he has no intention of retiring anytime soon.

“I don’t think about retiring. I will be retired at the proper time, ” he insisted.

Harvey has recently finished working on the movies Gandhi of the Month, Chosen and Lies We Tell, as well as promoting his current flick Youth – so his slate is showing no sign of drying up. And speaking to the outlet, Harvey revealed the rules he sticks to as one of Hollywood’s most well respected actors.

“An actor doesn’t make himself cry or laugh, ” he said. “An actor is never nude in a scene. Never any of those things. An actor plays a scene in the best way he knows how, in the most profound way he can summon up the meaning of that event. Whatever comes out is in the service of bringing a moment of truth to the stage.”

Despite his success, Harvey makes it his mission to steer clear of reviews of his work. Instead, he trusts his own intuition when it comes to his standard of performance.

“No one else can review me as severely as I review myself, ” he added.

This article was first published at Belfast Telegraph