Someone asked me yesterday if Dracula met Saruman and there was a fight, who would win. I just looked at this man. What an idiotic thing to say. I mean, really, it was half-witted.

Acting as a profession came to me by chance: in 1946, after the war, I was having lunch with my cousin, who was the Italian ambassador, and he asked, 'What are you going to do now you're out of uniform?' I said, 'I'm pretty inventive, and I can imitate people,' and he said, 'Have you thought about being an actor?'

Peter Jackson's instincts are extraordinary, as is his stamina.

It's a band singing on how metal should be played, the effect it has on the band and its listeners.

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.

To be a legend, you've either got to be dead or excessively old.

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.