I was terribly shy when I was growing up, I really wasn't confident with other people and I think I was always afraid of up or not being this very cool, amazing person that I wanted to be.

It's dangerous talking about yourself too much because you find yourself talking in sound bites.

Doing press is like eating at McDonald's: while it's going on it's vaguely enjoyable - you're seduced by your own vanity and taking yourself rather seriously - but immediately afterwards you feel sick.

There's something helpful about the fast pace of a TV set where everything has to be finished by the end of the week. You have to finish the episode; it doesn't matter how long you have to go on Friday night, but you have to get it done.

In my first few years as an actor, I took one terrible TV job after another. But even as I laughed off my awful roles and made fun of myself to friends, my work made me cringe - I dreaded anyone's seeing it. I was crushed that I wasn't doing anything I was proud of.

It's very difficult to find the time or the money for people to organize rehearsals for some movies. It staggers me how little preparation often goes into these scenes which are difficult and complicated. You think, "God, it's crazy. I've never met this person before and here I am having to work at how to do a whole performance on the set." It was great to have a few days of just talking to Michael [Caine] and Daniel [Barber] and thinking about the characters and the relationship between them before we started shooting.

So far I haven't really been prominent enough to get critical attention focused on me. So, of course, I fully expect bad reviews, but I will be wracked with misery as a result.