I have just returned from the dubbing studio where I spoke into a microphone as Severus Snape for absolutely the last time.

With the best intentions, the job of acting can become a display of accumulated bad habits, trapped instincts and blocked energies. Working with the Alexander Technique has given me sightings of another way... Mind and body, work and life together. Real imaginative freedom.

Do you know that moment when you paint a landscape as a child and, when you're maybe under seven or something, the sky is just a blue stripe across the top of the paper? And then there's that somewhat disappointing moment when the teacher tells you that the sky actually comes down in amongst all the branches. And it's like life changes at that moment and becomes much more complicated and a little bit more boring, as it's rather tedious to fill in the branches.

I have this feeling that if I could sort out what's on my dining room table, everything would fall into place.

I've never been able to plan my life. I just lurch from indecision to indecision.

I love working in New York theater.

My definition of palatable might be slightly different from yours.