My looks aren't something that come dazzlingly through in everything I do. I can be made to look one way or the other fairly easily... I am still not recognised on the street that much.

Firth - all dodgy 'tache and frantic eyebrows - has got the sexual allure of a man who runs a swingers' club in Surbiton.

To be bothered wherever you go - it's not a rational thing to want at all.

My primary instinct as an actor is not the big transformation. It's thrilling if a performer can do that well, but that's not me. Often with actors, it's a case of witnessing a big party piece but wondering afterwards, where's the substance?

People have the idea of missionaries as going out with the Bible and hitting natives with it. It's not really what they were doing. They were all doing something rather different.

It was mainly to do with Helen Hunt, to be honest. That's what drew my attention to it. I was interested in the fact that she was going to be directing. I'd never met her but she projects a degree of intelligence and it was convincing t me that she'd be able to handle this sort of material very well.

I like playing strange characters. Some people might say it has something to do with a hidden part of myself, but I think it's a lot simpler than that: normal people are just not very interesting.