For all the cynicism that the world contains, people are a little more open to those things that maybe are to do with returning you to some kind of simpler, happier state.

I'm basically quite a cheerful person.

I looked at the 1950 animated film [Cinderella], I read a couple of editions of the fairy tale that I have in my house and all of it seemed to say that there was room for a version that delivered, in this story, which seems to invite a feeling in people and I think that is some version of a classical world.

If you've done a brilliant version it becomes something else.

I think the best actors are the most generous, the kindest, the greatest people and at their worst they are vain, greedy and insecure.

The best actors, I think, have a childlike quality. They have a sort of an ability to lose themselves. There's still some silliness.

Even if people are all from the same place, there can be very, very different approaches. It's one of the things I'm fascinated by. It's why I like directing. I like to see how different people approach trying to be truthful, on camera or in the theater, and whether you can make them match up.