If you don't have heroes in the beginning, you don't grow.

Sometimes directors will hire you and say, 'Oh, we love your work.' And then they start to tell you how to do it. I say, 'Hey, man, back off. You hired me to do it. Let me do it.'

We all have a cradle-to-the-grave journey to make and, in between, what do you do? There's got to be something hereafter.

You really have to soak up the culture of the people to get it right. If you're making a fiction film, it's entertainment, but you want it to be as real as possible.

I can always grow a little bit, and try to do something different. So I'm always looking for what's out there - the potential.

My father's people... are from Fairfax in northern Virginia, just across the Mason-Dixon line. So it was an honour to play Lee, he was a great general.

Everybody likes to win.