The best shows succeed because they tap into a national conversation.

For me the rehearsal period is the part I most enjoy. It's the creating of the story.

I guess I'm just good at playing repressed individuals. I'm lucky because those are often the roles that catch people's eyes.

I love playing sport.

Theres something important, as an actor, about allowing yourself to be approached by people to do roles. People see different things in you.

I always resented Tom [Hardy] for turning up on Band Of Brothers and getting the girl — in fact, the only girl in a cast of hundreds of smelly men! I, on the other hand, spent eight months with my face squashed up against someone else’s backside in one sodden trench after another. And it looks as if Tom might have got the girl again [in Colditz], damn his eyes.

Temperamentally I'm not a natural producer, because I don't have the patience.