No, no, I was only funny on stage, really. I think I was funny as a person toward my classmates when I was very young. You know, when I was a child, up to about the age of 12.

I like to relish words and sentences, and phraseology, and there's not much facility for that [playing Maigret].

Marketing is what gets you noticed.

But, actually, so many of the clerics that I've met, particularly the Church of England clerics, are people of such extraordinary smugness and arrogance and conceitedness who are extraordinarily presumptuous about the significance of their position in society.

I've read about eight or ten of the original novels, and one of them is where Maigret's in bed for the entire story! His wife is running around and solving the case!

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.

Lord, thy one-liners are as good as thy tricks. Thou art indeed an all-round family entertainer.