I like this other world, this forgetting of myself. The actor works in order to escape, not to find himself. You become an actor by leaving yourself, and then you have to keep acting. How tragic!

I love to invent - avoiding the truth. I need to dramatize.

I'm very glad to have something to be passionate about. I can't imagine a life without passion.

I don't expect too much from the afterlife, I think that I know very well what pain is. When I think of the end of my life, I think mainly: I didn't do nothing, but I could have done more.

As a painter you're responsible yourself, 100 percent. In film, you have the editor, the director, the other actors. It has the advantage of not being solitary.

No one has taken my heart in their hand. I haven't given it... I have lent myself, rented myself out, but never given myself.

Of course it's difficult to top a box office success like Emmanuelle, so it will always be my most important work. But that's nothing to be ashamed of.