The better you are as a parent, the richer the nest you've built, the more difficult it is for your kids to leave. So they have to invent things to dislike about you. And they're brilliant at it.

I wanted to find my limitations so I decided to do Shylock. And if I fail? I've never been afraid of that. I have other fears - doing bad work knowingly is the worst fear.

I'm sixty-eight, I cry every chance I can.

If you're waiting for the job, you're dead.

It isn’t a big jump in the imagination to see yourself living alone like Mr Hoppy.

I feel cheated never being able to know what it's like to get pregnant, carry a child and breast-feed.

So, most of it was done over the phone. But one of the first things I did as a director, because it's one of the first things you should do, even though most don't, is to ask good actors who they think is right for the part. They know better than anybody. But without missing a beat Maggie said Pauline Collins. I didn't know Pauline because I hadn't seen Shirley Valentine, but then I saw this thing that she did with Woody Allen [You Will Meet A Tall Dark Stranger], in which she was wonderful as a psychic, and I said to her on the phone: "The dialogue seemed improvised."