Which is strange - I've always thought of myself as someone who writes out of difficulty. And I did do that, but I came out on the side of light more often than not.

Alan Rickman was such a terrific actor, and that was such a terrific character that he played. And it was a joy to be with him. We used to laugh together because we ran out of reaction shots. They were always - when everything had been done and the children were finished, they would turn the camera around and we'd have to do various reaction shots of amazement or sadness and things. We used to say we'd got to about number 200-and-something and we'd run out of knowing what to do when the camera came around on us. But he was a joy.

Sort of what you do in drama school when asked to play something way out of your reach. Anyway, we used to laugh a lot about that. I used to say I'm not going to act old, Penelope. I'll just be myself.

I like the ephemeral thing about theatre, every performance is like a ghost - it's there and then it's gone.

If someone is going to talk about the process of making a film, it should be the director.

The thing is, often press people ask questions that are so personal that even your nearest and dearest wouldn't ask them.

It was - it's always very nice to be somebody rather grand.