The process of acting is no different [playing human or ape]. You're embodying the character. You're creating the psychology and the physicality. You're living the moment.

No matter how extreme things get, it still has that ring of truth about it that backs the characters - even though they're despicable and what they're doing isn't right you still care for their fate.

I expect at some point I'll probably want to go back on stage and do some theater, because I've not done theater in 10 years.

I remember once, I read in a horoscope, because I'm an Aries, I read this terrible thing, which really affected me, which said, "You will never be original. You will always be an interpreter." (Laughs) I thought, "Oh my God." You know, I had to live with that on my back for [all my life].

I wanted to be a painter, really, when I was growing up as a kid. It was one thing that really took a grip on me.

I'd already started directing short films when we were doing 'Lord of the Rings,' then videogame projects.

We're live in a world that has, in many ways, become desensitized and unable to empathize with other cultures and species. The dangerous part is that we objectify others and have somehow removed ourselves, mentally, from the very planet we inhabit.