I try to not make safe choices, but I also like to do stuff which is interesting and is sort of exciting in some way and accessible.

I used to do stuff at college. I could do voices. I could make some people laugh. I wasn't the class clown, but I knew I had this skill.

All those people who go around saying Life begins at forty, they're notable by their absence. The nerve.

I'm an entertainer. I don't go round saying I'm a paragon of virtue, so that is clearly not in the public interest.

I am not a politician going around bragging about family values or putting myself on some ridiculous virtuous pedestal. I write comedy. And I am an actor. I am not going to solve the nation's problems. I don't actually spend my life in the way the tabloids like to think I do. I actually spend 95 percent of it writing comedy. Sober. Well, nearly sober anyway.

As soon as I see period costume, I turn off. It's like hearing drama on Radio 4.

Comedy can be silly and gross and offensive, as long as there's sort of a point. You can make a joke that, on the face of it, is racist. Ostensibly someone can appear to be racist, but if you know you're making a point about race, and not just being pig-headed, then you can do that. I think some people who don't understand comedy will have a knee-jerk reaction to some stuff, and will always be offended by it because they don't understand it. Some people react to it in a vociferous way, which is unsophisticated, but there's always going to be those people out there.