For a woman to say she has had a dalliance with another woman is quite trendy these days. I do not like trendiness. Life isn't about dalliances - it's about individuals. You come across people in your life that you find very interesting. It's not about something flighty.

You can't ignore the system and the power you acquire as an actor if you're in films that are successful.

I have seen the Gore documentary 'An Inconvenient Truth,' just released in the States, and admired the acutely revolutionary delivery of the slideshow assisted talk he has now been giving for some 16 years.

I grew up in a strongly socialist family. While I was at school, I worked in party politics and with organizations like the Anti-Nazi League. Everywhere I saw it, I fought prejudice.

I think politics can no longer be assigned to parliamentary activity and it probably never could be. But politics with a small p and the history of trade union movement really interests me.

I was picked up on a London street by a model agent. She took me to her office and then sent me to Paris to work in shows. It was supposed to be two weeks, but I ended up living there with my Zimbabwean boyfriend. I made enough money modeling and acting in French movies to buy a nice flat.

When I was little it was a great time for film-making, with stuff like Mike Nichols' 'Silkwood.' The films you see in that pre-secondary-school stage stay with you in a very particular way.