“I was horrified when Richard Chamberlain and Rupert Everett said gay actors should stay in the closet. They were saying to people that they should live a lie and not be liberated, to live in fear of being found out.”

You should *have* an experience; it shouldn’t just *be* an experience.

Most people will never know anything beyond what they see with their own two eyes.

You could then, when you lay that as the groundwork, say, “Here I am. This is what I think. I come in peace.” Then you’re able to push out, to be able to talk about more things. And that’s been a really heartening thing about my life, actually.

In terms of the sort of class, and the sort of snobby, slightly on the back-foot thing Britain has. But it’s much more prevalent in America.

It’s about how you exist as a person in the world, and the idea that your work is more important than you as a person is a horrible, horrible message.

You’ll see Dame Judi Dench in a Bond film, in Shakespeare and then starring in her own sitcom. You never see that here with Meryl Streep.

Usually, there’s a story I’ve told that leads up to why I’m singing the song. The whole concept of the show was about being authentic and connecting with these songs. The best way to do that was in a room with an audience and for people to listen to that.

Nowadays people don’t know how to handle it if all the ends aren’t tied up and they’re not told what to think in films. And if they’re challenged, they think it’s something wrong with the film.

It is actually important to do songs they’re familiar with. Also, I love those songs. In a way, I think I’ve changed people’s perceptions of what a cabaret show like this could be.

A sweaty Macbeth with blood on his arms coming in fresh from the battle doesn’t interest me.

My feeling about work is it’s much more about the experience of doing it than the end product. Sometimes things that are really great and make lots of money are miserable to make, and vice versa.

When there’s an adult person who’s scaring you, you grow up pretty quickly.

It is not hard to feel like an outsider. I think we have all felt like that at one time or another.

It’s really rare for film directors to be that interested in things other than themselves.

I’m Scottish first, and it’s odd to hear that I’m a Scottish-American.

Sometimes people get really sniffy about the films you choose if you’ve done more dramatic projects or you’re classically trained.