I've never understood the notion that actors and actresses should look great on-screen just because they're on-screen. That doesn't make sense to me.

So I won an Oscar. It's amazing. I've got that for the rest of my life for a performance I am proud of. It nearly killed me. I am really proud of the film. That's it, moving on.

When you're telling a story, I think you should tell it to its fullest, with reckless abandon, and absolutely let it be what it is.

I love the routine. I love getting up in the morning and getting breakfast and packing lunches and doing the school run. Those things are really important to me. Because I think that those small but key moments are crucial for a kid.

Just coming to terms with the fact that I got to play April Wheeler [Revolutionary Road] and Hanna Schmitz [The Reader] in one year, let alone in my lifetime. I'm very, very aware of how rare that is as an opportunity for any one person. I can't tell you how much I've been able to take away from these experiences creatively. I really, really learned so much about acting, about myself... all of those things. It's difficult to talk about the actor's process without sounding like an arrogant asshole but they really were very challenging.

I look very different from how people expect me to be... Clearly they think I'm a great big fat viking.

Just because society, and government, and whatever was different 100 years ago, doesn't mean that people didn't have sex, pick their nose, or swear.