We made our Moriarty very different to [Conan] Doyle's. He's Irish, and he brings all his charm, his twinkle and his humor to it while he's also terrifying.

The question I ask myself is: have I really just become a squeamish middle-aged man, or has something happened to the horror genre that shows a growing appetite for watching torture, or at least a desire to explore it on film? And if so, why would that be? I can't pretend I know. I just know I don't like it.

I always compare reading anything on the Internet to listening at doors. If you don't want to hear anything bad about yourself, you should never do it.

It was all quite ghastly and I was very fond of it.

At school I briefly wanted to be a palaeontologist, but I was no good at chemistry and physics.

Benedict is bumbly, sweet, affable; the nicest man you've met.

You can always expect tragedy as well as adventure; that's just how it goes.