I think it's [the AIDS fight] the most important and most pressing one - I think it's a global emergency and I think in a way we all have to address it and engage with it because I think it's the biggest threat to the human race that we have ever faced.

I hate the way market forces try to separate us out in to the appropriate demographic - basically in order to sell us things. We need to find stories that we can enjoy together, not separately.

I think the point about ActionAid is what it's asking people to do is engage with poor people in developing countries and understand what their lives are like and understand how the way we live our lives impacts on theirs.

It’s about time a 55-year-old British woman is the heroine of an action movie. I may have to write it.

The thing that influenced me most in relation to 'Nanny McPhee' were the Westerns I watched with my father. All the Spaghetti Westerns; all the Virginians; all the High Chaparrals. Because if you think about the form, it's a stranger from out of town.

The only way you can have it all is by delegating all the running of the home to other people - which I don't ever want to do... So you do it yourself, and it takes time and energy and effort. And if you give it the time, it's profoundly enjoyable.

My worst quality is impatience.