Sometimes you're wrong, but if I'm a repeat customer, it means I must have valued the past experiences.

Usually when you meet with a director, just meeting them after you've seen something you're interested in, they say, "Oh I'd love to work together," and sometimes you never hear from them again.

Sometimes I think women are lucky because they can develop in ways men can't. The old-boy network may be oppressive to women, but it actually stunts men in terms of personal growth.

Performing is about developing empathy, which leads us to a broader view of the world and encourages us to develop compassion; so we can comfort each other and not be so brutal with each other.

It's true in the beginning I started playing villains, and I think that's pretty clear, because if you don't conventionally look a certain way and you've got a certain kind of presence when you're young, then what's available to you is character roles, and the best character roles when you're young tend to be villains.

Mounting those red stairs [in Cannes] is something I've done with a very different intention many times. So it's interesting any time you witness those shifts of perspective. The beach scenes were also fun. It felt very strange and very theatrical to kind of commandeer it and have La Mer booming over the speakers.

I aspire to be an instrument of the director. I'm happiest like that. The stronger the director, the more I'm willing to give them. It's not just about admiration for their films, it's how they deal with you, and whether they get you or the way you work. If they don't, you better adjust your way of working to suit them. I want to work with people who are good at what they do, and people who are passionate. As you get older, you suffer fools less easily. That's why there's all those cranky character actors. I'm an exception. I'm a sweetheart.