I'm happiest on set because I'm not myself. I'm someone else. The moustache, the dinner jacket. It's not me. You're always this sort of double, and it's liberating. Imagine being stuck with yourself... all those doubts.

I discovered that silent film is almost an advantage. You just have to think of the feeling for it to show. No lines pollute it. It doesn't take much - a gaze, an eyelash flutter - for the emotion to be vivid.

It was always about the story rather than the character.

I don't want everyone to like me, and I don't choose who likes me. You have to give them the choice, give them the option.

I don't care about my image.

I want to work with a director who becomes my brother, my father, for two months. You give yourself over to that person.

I don't like having too many projects in the pipeline. I like to focus on what's at hand.