I feel safe in saying this, and that is that Peter Weir is without a doubt one of the greatest filmmakers of all time. I'd open a door in a movie for him if he asked me to.

I come down as an actor and my marks are already laid out on the floor - somebody else organized what I'm going to do. I think, why am I here? And why I'm here is to express the words with some sort of vague emotion and make them seem real. I wanted to go back to how it was before.

For some ungodly reason, I end up being naked in a lot of stuff. But there is a certain grace and kudos that come with taking your clothes off on the first day, a respect that is given by the rest of the cast.

An actor has so much less space and responsibility. Sometimes you come on, and there are already tape marks for where you are supposed to stand, and the dialogue is already decided on. If you want to make a change and contribute something, it has to be approved by a number of people.

So the actual privilege is that you can then take time off - and if you don't, you're a fool. You're earning all this money to support children whom you then don't see, which is absurd.

When I became a father acting sort of took the place of what I did in my free time and my children became the main focus. I play a lot and my children play. Both my sons - my daughter's still too young really - have surpassed me with their music skills, which is wildly irritating.

The trouble with talking about acting is that it's like sex. It's enormously fun to do but just dreadfully embarrassing when you have to talk about it.