Bruce Dern: ‘If you want to succeed in any craft, you have to be patient’

‘I spent my first year learning to act in silence, focusing on character and expression without uttering a word’: Bruce Dern. Photograph: James Mankoff

Ours was a family that got shit done. My grandfather was America’s Secretary of War, previously the governor of Utah. My dad’s law partner – my godfather – ran for the presidency, twice. Every week important people joined us at dinner. What I saw put me off politics for life.

At 14, my parents sent me to a boarding school in New England. My protest was the longest conversation I ever had with my father, and it only lasted 20 minutes. Later, I realised they just wanted me out of the way.