It is very linear storytelling, and I think that's not so much the fashion. I was watching a new drama the other night which was extremely non-linear, where you flash back and flash forward in ways that certainly keeps you on your toes as the audience. There's not much of that courage with the storytelling in our Maigret film.
Rowan AtkinsonI'm sure that a French production of this [Maigret series] would be different. For better or worse, who's to say, but probably not very good for 8 o'clock on ITV.
Rowan AtkinsonThe right to ridicule is far more important to society than any right not to be ridiculed because one in my view represents openness - and the other represents oppression.
Rowan AtkinsonI can be reasonably funny and light-hearted when I'm in the company of good friends, but I'm not a jokesmith. I tend to be quite serious.
Rowan AtkinsonTo criticise a person for their race is a manifestly irrational and ridiculous. But to criticise their religion - that is a right. That is a freedom.
Rowan AtkinsonThe older you get, the more you realise how happenstance... has helped to determine your path through life.
Rowan AtkinsonWhat directors of television drama constantly tell you is 'Don't act it. Don't try. Don't emphasise that word'. Whereas with someone like Blackadder, even though he's a relatively low key character in a way, he did relish the lines that he had and the words that he was given, with a lot of inflection.
Rowan Atkinson