But I always feel that whatever I do, I could do better. I suppose it is perfectionism.
Rowan AtkinsonThe 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.
Rowan AtkinsonI don't think you should be too absolutist about what you play and what you don't play.
Rowan Atkinson[Maigret] is terribly self-contained, not that I would ever wish him to be any more comic, particularly, but in the second film we've made you see he's a little more ironic from time to time. But as I say, that's just work in progress.
Rowan AtkinsonThis is sort of inflection-free acting [playing Maigret], and I really wasn't sure if I could do it - you make your mind up on whether I've succeeded or not. But yes, I found it difficult when we were shooting; it was a couple of weeks before I settled into not worrying - to finding a way of delivering those lines - so my worries of many months before I think had been justified. I found it a difficult way of being.
Rowan Atkinson