As an actor, you try and be cool, but one of the reasons you become an actor is because you're a film fan. And then you're like, 'Oh my god, Ridley Scott just spoke to me!'

In any kind of comic scene you're going to perhaps push the boundaries of plausibility but as long as there is some semblance of logic I think as an audience you'll buy it and as an actor, when it comes to playing things like that, it gives you something to delve into. When I don't buy into a comic scene is the type of scenario where you'd just go: "Well, that would never happen."

There's nothing so unattractive as vanity... particularly male vanity.

For a man, there's a big responsibility that comes with having a boy because men are made by their fathers. If you've got a good productive man around it's better. I have such a close relationship with my dad and that responsibility to produce a good man is something I think about.

Every audition I get, I agonise over and I put everything I can into it.

I'm sure that my father becoming seriously ill when I was 14 had a lot to do with my going from chubby to fat.

If you're a casting director, you're going to be curious to see what Timothy Spall's son is like. But when you get in the door, you have to have something to offer.