I remember thinking, when I was in my early 30s, that this is the best age to be, and I still believe your 30s are a wonderful time.

The timing of comedy is so difficult. You've got to leave room for a laugh, you don't want to kill the laugh, but on film, you can't just suddenly stop for a laugh and then carry on. So, I think it's a real art form, comedy on film.

I certainly think that he [Alan Rickman] was a kind of actor who needed to grow into his maturity to realize the potential, the huge potential that he had.

Directors always used to be like the police to me - the enemy, the people to tell me what to do when I didn't want to do it. But I've lived with one for a while now and I guess I can put myself more in their position. You shouldn't be too sympathetic to them.

I'm not a communist, of course. But I do think that everything is down to economics. Capitalism doesn't change.

I hate people eating on film. I hate it even worse on the radio, when people eat on the radio. I just can't stand it.

I think of myself as being a bit of a wimp deep down - a bourgeois wimp - and I'm fighting that. I think all Brits are, maybe.