I'm very much more choosy now. I do stuff that I really, really, really like.

I try to make everyone around me feel comfortable.

Just because I have made a point of never losing my accent it doesn't mean I'm an eel-and-pie yob.

I did everything. I ran my life exactly as I wanted to, all the time. I never listened to anybody. I'm pig-headed.

To me, 'Educating Rita' is the most perfect performance I could give of a character who was as far away from me as you could possibly get and of all the films I have ever been in, I think it may be the one I am most proud of.

I've always played very human sort of characters.

I don't meet stockbrokers or carpenters or coal miners; I spend all day with actors, composers and photographers.