I know I had my equivalents in Adrian Lester and Lenny James when I was at drama school. I remember David Harewood doing 'Othello' at the National, and Adrian Lester having done Cheek by Jowl's famous 'As You Like It and Company' at the Donmar. Not necessarily performances I saw, but just the fact they happened was massively encouraging.

I gravitate towards anything that feels challenging to me, that feels like it's gonna be saying something a bit different and new to the audience, and anything that moves me. I do movies that I would want to see, so I don't necessarily gravitate towards any genre in particular. I just try and do the best work I can and also try to keep the audience guessing.

I think the notion that we are different just because of skin color, and that we should be kept apart or kept from interbreeding, is very hurtful.

I'm very aware that people find my wife and I's marriage disagreeable. But all I have to do is look at my four kids, and the love I have in my heart for my wife after 18 years of marriage, and the ugliness does fade.

I think that having a black president in America has been a seismic shift, in terms of what has been going on racially in America. I think that America is now engaging with how we have come to this point.

I have a bee in my bonnet as to how few black historical figures one sees on film; incredible stories, stories from which we are living the legacy and which just don't get made.

My ambition is to keep the audience guessing... that is my path to a long career.