Bertie Carvel: What did you want to be when you were growing up?

What did you want to be when you were growing up?

Originally asked

The Guardian, to a different person each week, The Q&A

This is a standing question in The Guardian's decades-long The Q&A and also recurs independently in career and life interviews.

You answer as yourself. Nobody on FLAPSS answers as anybody else.

Recorded Bertie Carvel said elsewhere, not written here

Luke Skywalker, for a time. After that, I mainly wanted to have a girlfriend one day.

The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 30 October 2021 source ↗

Others on this question

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Mario Molina Atmospheric chemist; Nobel laureate in Chemistry, 1995

For me, it was just a thrill. I just remember thinking at that time, this is the sort of thing I would like to do, if I could. I did not come from a family of scientists. My father was a lawyer, my older brother was a lawyer.

Recorded Academy of Achievement interview, Sun Valley, Idaho, 29 June 1996 source ↗

Rachel Whiteread English artist

First something medical, then, without any doubt, an artist.

Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 2 December 2017 source ↗

Brendan Gleeson Irish actor and director

Huckleberry Finn.

Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 31 December 2016 source ↗

Desmond Tutu Anglican Archbishop of Cape Town; chair of South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission; Nobel Peace Prize, 1984

I know that for a very long time my consuming passion, which was confirmed when I contracted TB — I had TB when I was about 12 or so — was I wanted to be a physician and when I got TB I was even more determined. I want to be physician so that I can find a cure for the scourge. And, in fact, I was admitted to medical school. If we had had the funds maybe today I would have been a physician.

Recorded Academy of Achievement interview source ↗