I would never be a television presenter. It's not something I could ever do.

Certainly in the second film [Maigret's Dead Man], which is quite a more unpleasant and darker story, it's quite different in tone and feel.

I'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.

[Maigret] is more internal. I think if we made more of these I might let him out a bit.

I suddenly think the job of acting is a difficult one. It's not as flip, irrelevant and shallow a calling as I thought it was in the Eighties.

I 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.

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.