The chemotherapy was very peculiar, something that makes you feel much worse than the cancer itself, a very nasty thing. I used to go to treatment on my own, and nearly everybody else was with somebody. I wouldn't have liked that. Why would you want to make anybody sit in those places?

When you get into the granny era, you're lucky to get anything.

The drama school was in Oxford - and it's funny to think of it, but in those days when I started out the University was nearly all male. And they certainly weren't mixed.

There was nobody in the family who had ever done anything like that before. My brothers - I had two brothers. They were twins. They both became architects. They were both six years older.

It's funny to be pigeonholed so late in life but there we are.

It made it feel impossible, quite honestly, because filming - you film come rain, come shine, come whatever. And it did rain a lot. And of course, that's what she must have gone through. Of course it rained; of course it was cold... But, you know, it really was quite hard to be out there in the rain.

I had been feeling a little rum. I didn't think it was anything serious because years ago I felt a lump and it was benign. I assumed this would be too. It kind of takes the wind out of your sails, and I don't know what the future holds, if anything.