About every four years, someone says to me, "I've got a friend who looks exactly like you." What can you say to this?

Acting is the most demanding, painful job in the world.

After you've read a novel, you only retain a vague memory of its contents. You remember the atmosphere, the odd image or phrase or vivid cameo.

Ninety-eight per cent of laughter is nothing to do with jokes, which do not deserve to bear the weight of all the funny stuff in the world.

It's worth turning up to an awards gig if you know you've won one but, since you never do know, it's not worth it.

Global warming, the ongoing destruction of the planet, Third World debt, the uselessness of the railways, the takeover by the corporations, the scary George Bush person: all these things are important and should be animating me into outrage. Yet somehow they do not.

It is more interesting to be compared to someone famous, because it lets you gauge what perceptions people have about your appearance.