I think that is so interesting. It is le Carré. There must be so much of him when he was younger. He's an interesting character. I don't want to say the word "passive" because there is something very active about the way he is passive, if that makes any sense: the nature of his watching and his listening is active. It is always so alive because he is, essentially, a spy.

Our job is to represent the truth of human nature, whether you're playing a tender love story that's set in a coffee shop or whether you're in 'The Avengers,' which is set in a Manhattan which is exploding.

I think cruelty is just loneliness disguised as bitterness.

I believe in the strength and intelligence and sensitivity of women. My mother, my sisters [they] are strong. My mum is a strong woman and I love her for it.

I loved adventure movies. I loved movies where people went on an adventure to an unknown land, an undiscovered country, or a new territory. I think there's something, right at the center of storytelling, that people love about that.

I've done my share of period stuff. I'm not sure why, but people say I have a period face. The bread and butter of British TV is Jane Austen adaptations and bridges and bonnets and boats and horses.

It was quite a European war until 1917, when the Americans joined up. They don't have the same sense of the loss of innocence and the cataclysmic loss of life. A whole generation was wiped out.