Mind the gap - it's the distance between life as you dream it and life as it is.

Maybe this is my morality coming in again but it was important to me that the actor [ in Notes On A Scandal] was above the age of consent. Although really, what's the difference between 15 and 16? It's the law, yeah, but he's very mature.

When something is a vocation, you don't really make a decision about it.

An actress once advised me, 'Make sure you do your own laundry - it will keep you honest.'

If you only exercise your soloist muscles, the other muscles quickly atrophy.

I think part of the disappointing failure of the political process in America today is that it's asking us to forget countries' historic connections to other countries, or to the laws that have been made. They're willfully asking people to forget their country's history, and focus only on the present. It's bizarre.

What I love about the theater is that you know who you're acting for: your audience. And the thing I find really hard in film is, you don't. The audience is invisible. And we're sitting there, hoping there's other people out there.