I put quite a few trees in last autumn. A lot of silver birch and a couple of native trees - just generally doing gardening, putting plants in and hedges in. It takes quite a lot of time and I love it.

I always prefer to work intensively on something and then move on to something else. I prefer not to get stuck in something that takes five or six years of my life.

A common misperception of me is... that I am a tough, rough northerner, which I suppose I am really. But I'm pretty mild-mannered most of the time. It's the parts that you play I guess. I don't mind it. I'm not a tough guy. I'd like to act as a fair, easy-going, kind man at some point.

It was such an interesting character and the film really explored his friendship with Bond and how it all went wrong, so it was a very personal journey for both characters.

There's a wealth of literature out there which, hopefully, will be, you know, exploded in the future, and I personally find it very rewarding to be involved with classic storytelling, and sort of legendary characters.

I'd been trying for a while to get parts that weren't just the English bad guy, so it was quite refreshing to be playing someone who was a compassionate, decent guy.

I think that you always have something left, that you take something of the character with you.