No one will guide you in the right direction, in the end you have to learn for yourself. You have to grow up yourself.

There's always a concern as an actor that you'll be boring unless your character is swinging from a chandelier.

As much as I long for a sort of security and consistency sometimes, I do enjoy sort of being busted around. I really don't know what's happening sometimes next week, let alone this year.

I love TV and I love making films and I love doing plays. I feel very lucky to be able to do all three.

I think people ought to do what they feel useful at the time. If I do things because I ought to do them, I switch off.

I wouldn't want to leave it so long before doing a play again, I get very stolid and sluggish if I do too much telly.

I don't feel like a romantic lead; I guess I feel more like a character actor.

The actor in me would always like to be more dashing, or slimmer, or have nicer hair.

Apart from earning an awful lot of money, why would you go to Hollywood?

You never know how films are going to do and it is daunting if I think about it.

I was quite a shy child. I would get terribly nervous and throw up before my birthday party. And then I would be fine. I feel the same now. I get nervous, then it's fine.

The fading light is us, and we are, for a moment so brief (...) beautiful.

The greatest sign of success for a teacher... is to be able to say, 'The children are now working as if I did not exist.'

Art is moral passion married to entertainment. Moral passion without entertainment is propaganda, and entertainment without moral passion is television.

When your results are good, you are obviously going to have a lot of press. And when you start to falter a little bit, you are going to have some criticism, and there is nothing abnormal in that.

It's nice to see something more pathetic than I feel right now.

Douglas Carswell accused all political parties of "deliberately cultivating the impression" that there would be a referendum.

When you play the game for fun, it's fun. When you play it for a living, it's a game of sorrows.

This time, we went up to Big Bear for 3-4 weeks and sequestered ourselves writing this album [ "The Black Crown"].

Fear of the future is worse than one's present fortune.

The greatest test of Christianity is the wear and tear of daily life; it is like the shining of silver: the more it is rubbed the brighter it grows.