I came to Ireland 20 years ago as a student, hitch-hiking round for a week and staying in Dublin.

With a theatre audience there's always the additional sense of a sustained challenge of which I'm acutely aware and for which you need to have the tools ready - your voice, physicality, brain.

The only work I did for the next five years after splitting from Vincent was work I'd already lined up.

I had the conviction that lovemaking fools you. The overpowering emotions it induces make you think you're sharing the same feelings as the other person and that they're imagining the same as you.

A relationship requires a lot of work and commitment.

I have done everything I can to make sure my daughter knows her father because you form your own identity by rebelling against your parents - but first you have to know them.

I look for people who're passionate, dedicated to the text, and in whom I trust completely.

It helped me when I decided that we're on this planet to learn to live together and get along.

On the stage, you alone hold the key, and on the night you have to trust that the director has inspired you enough to take the material and run with it.

Theatre is a sacred space for actors. You are responsible; you are in the driving-seat.

My father was absent and he was a hero to me.

We live in an age of miracles so commonplace that it can be difficult to see them as anything other than part of the daily texture of living

Hatred is settled anger.

But today the quickest way to save your bottom line is to cut off research.

The most affectionate creature in the world is a wet dog.

I love the way art moves people emotionally. I love the fact that when someone purchases art it is the one thing that will last for generations.

You'll never meet a nicer person, let alone a nicer actress, than Mary Steenburgen.

I don't think you should categorize yourself as an artist.

Only to the rational animal is it given to follow voluntarily what happens; but simply to follow is a necessity imposed on all.

To open in a loving way is to let awareness notice that tightening.

Acting is about acting, not about being a movie star.