“The greatest thing an actor can experience is discovery. The greatest thing an artist can walk away with is to learn something about themselves and the world and this was one of those.”

There’s peace in understanding that I have only one life, here and now, and I’m responsible.

I phoned my grandparents and my grandfather said ‘We saw your movie.’ ‘Which one?’ I said. He shouted ‘Betty, what was the name of that movie I didn’t like?

Democracy doesn’t work unless people are well informed, and I don’t know that we are. People just don’t have the time. Most people’s daily lives are just about surviving. Most people don’t have time to really study crucial issues.

Ideals are peaceful. History is violent.

Fame is a Bleet, man.

By employing the intelligence of natural systems we can create industry, buildings, even regional plans that see nature and commerce not as mutually exclusive but mutually coexisting.

I’m one of those people you hate because of genetics. It’s the truth.

The woman is the reflection of her man

Yeah. And it was too much of what you shouldn’t be doing instead of what you should be doing. I get enraged when people start telling other people how to live their lives. It drives me mental.

Personally I like ageing. With age comes wisdom and I have said it before and I say it again, I will take wisdom over youth any day.

Any love involves loss, and that’s the risk you take. And the greater the love, the greater the loss. I certainly feel that now with the woman I’m with, and the children that I have. But whatever the course may be, this time together is extraordinary.

Do you know how you tell real love? It’s when someone else’s interest trumps your own.

When I got untethered from the comfort of religion, it wasn’t a loss of faith for me, it was a discovery of self. I had faith that I’m capable enough to handle any situation. There’s peace in understanding that I have only one life, here and now, and that I’m responsible.

Gay marriage is inevitable. The next generation, they get it. It is just a matter of time before it becomes a reality.

Being married means I can break wind and eat ice cream in bed.

The idea that marriage has to be for all time – that I don’t understand.

Every portrait that is painted with feeling is a portrait of the artist, not of the sitter.

Artistically, you want to be able to do a lot of things that can challenge you to not just stay in the same thing.

Like any artist without an art form, she became dangerous.

Art is the only serious thing in the world. And the artist is the only person who is never serious.

Every artist was first an amateur.

The fact that no one understands you doesn’t mean you’re an artist.

Some artists just ruin their voices because they don’t know any better.

I am an artist. I am interested in life.