“It’s still too early to say how my wife will influence my life. But I do already know that it’s sometimes hard work living with her.”

I can understand that the whole world is interested in my wife Madonna. That’s even why I married her.

I think it’s that much harder to make a good comedy than it is straight and apparently serious.

I like to think that we’ve got a plan, so let’s stick to it. That said, once we’ve stuck to it, we’re allowed as much improvisation as anyone cares to indulge themselves in.

I suppose directing on set is the most fun because it’s a good crack and you feel you’re on the battlefield whereas writing is a fairly solitary undertaking.

I don’t like the idea of agents in a typical form. The idea of agents, to me, brings up the idea of a man in a very boring suit who’s not very good looking and doesn’t have much attention to style.

I’m not under too much of an illusion of how smart or un-smart I am because filmmaking ultimately is about teamwork.

It’s not easy to strap yourself down to a desk and bash on a keyboard when you know you can direct lots of films, because directing films is fun and interactive and gregarious. Writing isn’t.

One of the interesting and exciting things about my job is watching technological ground being pioneered.

I got too fed up with films that didn’t make you think. I liked the idea of one that you’d have to be dancing around with. I like my mind to be engaged when I watch a film.

I’d like to work with the missus, but there’s nothing in the pipeline at the moment.

Previously, on Lock, Stock, I went to bed at two in the morning and woke up at five in the morning, and on this one I was known to nod off on the set occasionally.

I like death. I’m a big fan of it.

I’m not politically motivated. I used to be – passionately. I used to be very Left wing. Then I went very Right wing, and now I rest somewhere in the middle.

I like filming in the UK – I’ll sleep in my own bed, which I’m really happy about.

It’s OK to have beliefs, just don’t believe in them.

Jake Green isn’t just Jake Green. Jake represents all of us. The colour green is the central column of the spectrum and the name Jake has all sorts of numerical values. All things come back to him within the film’s world of cons and games.

Basically, I started singing when I started talking. Music has just been my saving grace my whole life.

Very early in life I became fascinated with the wonders language can achieve. And I began playing with words.

It was early detection that saved my voice – and I imagine, my life.

It was still early, and the sun’s lower limb was just free of the hill, his rays, ungenial and peering, addressed the eye rather than the touch as yet.

Sweet is the breath of morn, her rising sweet, With charm of earliest birds.

If I had been married earlier in life, I wouldn’t have seen the double helix. I would have been taking care of the kids on Saturday. On the other hand, I was lonely a lot of the time.

Everybody gets told to write about what they know. The trouble with many of us is that at the earlier stages of life we think we know everything- or to put it more usefully, we are often unaware of the scope and structure of our ignorance.

Sweet is the breath of morn, her rising sweet, With charm of earliest birds.