I'm much softer than people think. I don't present to the world an emotional face. I'm pretty good at self-control, but I am easily moved.

Lon Chaney and Boris Karloff didn't like the word 'horror'. They, like I, went for the French description: 'the theatre of the fantastique'.

I thought that people should know about the dangers of Satanism, and diabolism does exist - there's no question about it.

I wasn't a spy. I'd have been spotted in five seconds. Yes, I was in intelligence, but that covered a multitude of things.

I think acting is a mixture of instinct, imagination and inventiveness. All you can learn as an actor is basic technique.

When I first read Lord of the Rings I wanted to see a film of it. But at that time the technology wasn't there, there was no such thing as CGI.

We don't always get the kind of work we want, but we always have a choice of whether to do it with good grace or not.