I never thought I was particularly good looking. But when I see old photographs, I realise that I was. I do wish I had known that at the time because beauty is power. I didn't realise how lucky I was to be young, beautiful and in Hollywood. It didn't hit me. Every day I woke up, went to the film studio and just got on with it.

The body is like a car: the older you become the more care you have to take care of it - and you don't leave a Ferrari out in the sun.

Age is just a number. It's totally irrelevant unless, of course, you happen to be a bottle of wine.

What is so weird is that young people who want to be 'celebrities' do not want to put in the hard work. They don't want to do the training, go to drama school, read Shakespeare, try different accents and study technique. They just want to be famous. It is not just in England; it's the same in America and all over Europe.

I don't believe in dieting.

I do it because I love acting, I love working, and whether it's radio, television, films, theater, I don't care as long as I can get out there and do it.

And sometimes when I would get in the morning, when we'd go out - we'd see shrapnel and bits of stuff in the streets and bombed buildings, and - but I was evacuated a lot. Every time the blitz got heavy, my parents would take us off to the country.