To 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.

It's not easy to take a sit-com and turn it into a feature.

The problem with Maigret is he hasn't got a limp, and he hasn't got a lisp, and he hasn't got a French accent, or a particular love of opera... or all those other things that people tend to attach to many fictional detectives. He's just an ordinary guy doing an extraordinary job, in a very interesting time.

I think I have an inner confidence that my tastes are pretty simple, that what I find funny finds a wide audience. I'm not particularly intellectual or clever or minority-focused in my creative instincts. And I'm certainly not aware of suppressing more sophisticated ambitions.

I like to juggle with one ball at a time. Then I put the ball down and do nothing for extended periods of time.

The path of my life is strewn with cow pats from the devil's own satanic herd!

Monty Python crowd; half of them came from Cambridge, and half of them came from Oxford. But, there seems to be this jewel, this sort of two headed tradition of doing comedy, of doing sketches, and that kind of thing.