I think what I loved in cinema - and what I mean by cinema is not just films, but proper, classical cinema - are the extraordinary moments that can occur on screen. At the same time, I do feel that cinema and theater feed each other. I feel like you can do close-up on stage and you can do something very bold and highly characterized - and, dare I say, theatrical - on camera. I think the cameras and the viewpoints shift depending on the intensity and integrity of your intention and focus on that.

If I'd had fame early on, I'd have been able to abuse it in the way that a young man should.

My own grandfathers were a submarine commander and a 'desert rats' tank operator in the Second World War.

Only when Stephen Strange has his accident and everything that he's ever had in his life falls apart that he becomes pretty monstrous. It's the self-loathing rage of a wounded animal and he doesn't have a coping mechanism at all. It ties in with the discipline and the magic of this world.

We all want to escape our circumstances, don't we? Especially if you are an actor.

I had to imagine myself into certain aspects of [Julian Assange] character for our version of events. That involved extrapolating based on clues in his biography, his public persona, photographs, and other accounts of him by people who encountered him during that extraordinary period from 2007 to 2010 that we charted in the film [The Fifth Estate]. So, it involved a lot of research but, sadly, no contact with the man himself.

Those are more universal things than some of the characters I play, who are slightly sociopathic. I keep reminding people I can do ordinary.