When I'm choosing projects to be a part of it's always a combination of so many different things. The primary thing is the director. But a very important element is, is it different enough from anything else I've ever done, or what I've last done.

I think still it is very fine not to want children. There are far too many people in the world. It is my contribution to ecology.

My fear of drama school is that the natural extraordinary but eccentric talent sometimes can't find its place in a drama school. And often that's the greatest talent. And it very much depends on the drama school and how it's run and the teachers. It's a different thing here in America as well because so many of your great actors go to class, which is sort of we don't do in England.

Film is a visceral experience so I think a good war movie is a valuable tool for making us understand what our military goes through, what the issues are, the good and bad sides of war and what we're asking our military to do.

Women are always self-effacing and self-denying. There's a term that enrages me, and I always used to swear that I'd never play characters described that way. The term is "long-suffering."

My dad's Russian. My mother's English. I would say my bottom half is Russian.

I always feel when you work with an artist and whenever I work with a really good photographer, I try to give him or her their own artistic freedom because that's the way you get the best work or at least the most interesting work.