I don't think that I want to meet any of the icons. I don't think that anybody can quite live up to your expectations.

Mike Leigh encourages you to choose a person that you know to base your character on. You write a whole list of people that you know and you go through that list in great depth with him. And then he chooses one of those people from your list.

I don't think that I want to meet any of the icons. I don't think that anybody can quite live up to your expectations.

I found that I could make people laugh doing people like Shirley Bassey. Fortunately it worked.

I cant read a note of music. I just do it all from ear.

I find singing as somebody else very liberating, it just frees me up.

When I think of Marilyn Monroe, and achieving her sound, I think of having a rather large bust. I think of her physically and I am just able to create her sound, because her physicality was so much to do with her sound.