I don't think I could live without a deck of cards in my hands.

I want to live every moment totally and intensely. Even when I'm giving an interview or talking to people, that's all that I'm thinking about.

I love to be with my son and my grandchildren, like normal people. I have no particular idea of what I represent to other people. It's very mysterious to me. I don't understand it.

The reason it has relevance is because I, as a popular Arab personality - the Arab people like me and respect me - thought it was time for me to make an ever so tiny statement about what I thought about this whole thing.

I had too many big passions in life and it gets in the way of work. You can't concentrate properly on the one thing.

This is one of the factors that also made me very much want to make this film, apart from the fact that I loved it. If the boy hadn't been Jewish and the man hadn't been Muslim, it wouldn't have made any difference to the film. I don't think it's relevant, really.

Working gets in the way of living.