Everyone comes up to me saying, 'Cooee, Julie! Hello!' as if I know them. Of course I don't bloody know them. Am I flummoxed by it? Sometimes. I think, 'Ooh, love, go easy.' For a time, I did feel this pressure that I had to be funny, but it passes.

It's getting better but men still earn more and there are more jobs for them. Ageism is a big thing. Parts for women disappear as you get older.

I think comedy's something you can't learn. It's an instinct, which makes it rather elusive.

I'll tell you how it happened. The phone rang. Paul, my agent, goes, 'Would you like to play Meryl Streep's?' I said, 'Yeeees! I'll do it, whatever it is.' He said, 'It's Mamma Mia!.' I said, 'Oh no, which character? The fat friend?

The characters do have a life of their own; it's weird.

I don't like being out of the crowd. It's lonely within a group.

In order to be creative you have to be allowed to fail.