Yeah, I did need a lot of breath [to play Margaret Thatcher]. I needed much more breath than I have, after all of my expensive drama school training. I couldn't keep up with her.

I wonder which of the megaton bombs Jesus, our President's personal savior, would have personally dropped on the sleeping families of Baghdad?

There's no road map on how to raise a family: it's always an enormous negotiation.

Personality is immediately apparent, from birth, and I don't think it really changes.

When my children were very young and I was working I had someone cooking for me. I don't have a cook now, I haven't had one for a number of years and I do it myself. But when they were all little it was hard to pay attention to everyone's homework at the end of the day and make dinner.

People want what they want. Sometimes you just have to walk in defiance of it and just be yourself.

The best thing about acting is when you're playing a scene and you actually become your character and lose yourself in that moment. That's when you know you've been succeeded at what you've worked very hard to accomplish in your profession. Those are the truly thrilling moments.