I grew up in the theater, and you can't improvise Shakespeare and Ibsen. You have to speak the language. But obviously, in a contemporary film, there's often room for improvisation and spontaneous things that happen. As long as I know what I'm trying to achieve in the scene, and when something comes up, I know that the response is genuine, I'm comfortable. That's really how I build everything.

I have no skills. The only thing I could possibly do is teach.

Then I did one fight scene, and they said it looked good. Because I did it well enough, they've given me more.

I find that everything I do is demanding, like Jack Bristow is a complicated man and I do a lot of explaining in the show, it takes a lot of energy and concentration.

If you were to come to the set of Alias, you'd know how silly we all are. And I mean, silly.

The hardest thing for me is not to keep laughing. Jennifer particularly is like a clown.

That's why, when Alias came along, I knew I'd be OK if the show was on for five or six years because the writing was so good and the creative team was so strong.