I never look a gift horse in the mouth. And I've been really, really lucky. I'm aware of that. And my career has been given to me by the people I've worked with, no question. The actors, the directors, the cinematographers, the writers, all of whom gave me the opportunity to work in the way that I have and I'm really grateful.

And it interferes with your ability to be a good actress if you're constantly aware of yourself as a person. To me, it isn't valuable to think about how I'm coming off all the time if I'm trying to create a character, because that's a process that I love. It's like falling in love and surrendering to another person or a character.

On every film, the clothes are half the battle in creating the character. I have a great deal of opinion about how my people are presented. We show a great deal by what we put on our bodies.

I'm curious about other people. That's the essence of my acting. I'm interested in what it would be like to be you.

I love acting, of course, but being with my husband and my children always brought me the greatest joy and happiness in life.

We're viewed as equals - but we're still not there yet. The challenge for our girls, I think, is dealing with that resistance. How can we lift and defuse it, how do we make it so our equality is not so threatening? Our girls are going to have to contend with that. I contend with it right now in every realm I operate in.

I think the most liberating thing I did early on was to free myself from any concern with my looks as they pertained to my work.