Most of the time I do feel like I need someone else when I'm alone. But I can still get by with just my own company and that makes me a stronger person.

I am not a scientist, but I don't need to be.

It's interesting in this day and age to do a film about political espionage and wiretapping. I don't think that those types of secrets that J. Edgar Hoover was able to obtain and keep for such a long period of time would be possible in today's world, with the Internet and WikiLeaks.

I'm not a big dreamer. I never have been. I remember fragments of my dream, and I try to take a traditional sort of approach to researching this project and doing preparation for it.

When I was young I used to have this thing where I wanted to see everything I used to think 'How can I die without seeing every inch of this world?'

I lived in Hollywood and, ironically, I didn't know you could just go out and get an agent and go on auditions and try and become an actor, I thought it was like a Masonic thing, like a blood line you had to belong to – until I was 13. Then I realised what you had to do. It is the one thing I know I want to do for the rest of my life.

I've never tried to reach a certain demographic of an audience or try to say: OK, now I'm going to do this type of film to transition myself into more adult roles. Or a romantic hero. Or whatever it may be.