Americans like the British kind of quirkiness and the strange accent. They find it kind of cute or something, with a certain charm.

Get out and make films. There are so many cameras now to suit any budget, so there are no excuses.

I think we all have a Wallace and Gromit inside us. Wallace is the part that has wild plans. Gromit is the sensible side, reining you in.

After studying in Sheffield, I went down to London to do my post-graduate degree at the National Film and Television School, embarking on the movie that would eventually become 'A Grand Day Out.

If you respect the audience enough, they can take onboard many things.

Like my father, I would never as a child throw anything away, keeping old toys, electric motors and bits of broken machines under my bed in what I called my Box of Useful Things.

My father, an architectural photographer, was an incurable tinkerer, maker and mender.