People think because I can make them laugh on the stage, I'll be able to make them laugh in person. That isn't the case at all. I am essentially a rather quiet, dull person who just happens to be a performer.

The Maigret stories are all very different in terms of the content and the way that the stories are told. They're not what I would call formulaic.

Apart from the fact that your physical ability starts to decline, I also think someone in their fifties being childlike becomes a little sad. You've got to be careful.

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.

To Be Successful You Don't Need Beautiful Face And Heroic Body, What You Need is Skillful Mind And Ability To Perform

[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.

It certainly helps, I think, with some actors to understand the process of acting. You see what extraordinary pressure they're under, there's a huge circus dedicated to a particular moment and they're got to deliver and it can help that you, even if empathetically alone, understand what they're doing.