I want to make a clear distinction between people who take acting seriously and people who call themselves actors because theyve been on reality TV or something.

We are not telling Tudor history; we are creating ' Wolf Hall ' from novels, which are already a rereading of Tudor history.

For me the rehearsal period is the part I most enjoy. It's the creating of the story.

I've always had a 'Work hard, play hard' attitude to life - I still do - but sometimes you get involved in something that needs a calm, methodical approach.

You know what it's like to feel anxious - it's horrible feeling anxious. It's stressful having that feeling, having butterflies in your stomach, even for a day, and you don't sleep at night.

I think people like to be scared. I think people like tension and suspense in a movie.

You can't do something that is morally vacuous or dysfunctional and then write it off saying, 'It wasn't my film, I was just doing a job in it.'

People need revelation, and then they need resolution.

My heroes were all in the theatre.

I think you can't be really posh and be an interesting actor. I'm a bit of a posh rough.

Temperamentally I'm not a natural producer, because I don't have the patience.

Psychology of small things rules.

I sit where the leaves of the maple and the gnarled and knotted gum are circling and drifting around me.

I mean, I feel like just a new person completely.

Creating is always so much more stimulating than destroying.

I lost my job as a cricket commentator for saying "I don't want to bore you with the details".

Congratulations. That was the stupidest thing I've ever seen. Ever.

A man guilty of poverty easily believes himself suspected.

Government investigations have always contributed more to our amusement than they have to our knowledge.

He who draws upon his own resources easily comes to an end of his wealth.

I recognize myself to be an intensely naive person. Most novelists are, despite frequent pretensions to deep socio-political insight.