In a way, 'Billy Elliot' was autobiographical. I can't dance, but I think his dancing was me discovering about writing and literature.

I always call Billy Elliot a fantasy autobiography because I never wanted to be a dancer, but I got a lot of stick from the other kids about wanting to be a writer and being interested in drama.

Culture is something that we all share and we are all the poorer for anyone excluded from it.

There’s no comparison. Veganism is the single most important thing that one can do today.

From kings to groundlings, Shakespeare made his work profound for everybody. That is how it should be. There is no hierarchy in theatre. It makes everyone part of a collective.

I write whenever it suits me. During a creative period I write every day a novel should not be interrupted.

People don't vanish from one's life they come back in disguise.

Ugly deeds are most estimable when hidden.

It's an up and down thing, the human goals, because the human is always an explorer, an adventurist.

I know I'm vulgar, but would you have me any other way?

[H]e that thinks absolute power purifies men's blood, and corrects the baseness of human nature, need read the history of this, or any other age, to be convinced to the contrary.

I feel like I have to top myself every film I do, and it gets hard.

We need to celebrate stories by women, for women, as just one more way to redress gender injustice.

I like to layer when I fly - the climate always changes from the airport to the plane to the new city.

Soon it will be possible to assert almost continuous surveillance over every citizen and maintain up-to-date complete files containing even the most personal information about the citizen.