“[Fifty Shades Darker director] James Foley directed Fear. And that’s what I love about this film, because it has a real sexy thriller element about it.”

I usually have a drink before a carpet because I find them really nerve-racking. Usually a tequila. An upper!

[Christian from the Fifty Shades Darker] is definitely a good person. I mean, he’s flawed like all of us, you know? And I guess all of his wounds or his trauma, he acts out sexually. Which is pretty normal. People have different wounds, people act different things out.

All the photographers were trying to just get me off, which was hilarious. But it was very, very amusing.

I think for me, home needs to be a sanctuary. I need to feel like I’ve escaped the day when I get home.

Particularly on social media, there is that level of detachment, some people feel like they can say whatever pops in their head .

I’m always listening to music to pump myself up.

I definitely don’t get recognized so I don’t have to deal with that.

I think the thriller aspect of this film [Fifty Shades Darker] is what excited me most.

I think working in the industry, I’d be pretty nervous to have a celebrity crush.

I did get a letter which was pretty alarming once. Well, it was sent to the Fifty Shades production office. And it was pretty … I’d say interesting. I don’t really want to go into that. But otherwise the response has been good, thankfully.

I did dancing and singing when I was little, and then when I was 12 years old my friends were taking speech and drama at school. They were private lessons, and I started doing that. Over the years everyone else dropped out and I just kept going. I loved it.

In Australia, everyone gets a nickname and people started calling me “Izzy” and I hated it so I just adopted Bella.

I was always into performing and dancing as a kid and acting was a safe place to have all my feelings, which is good as a child.

I’m just a psycho myself. I loved playing Leila [from Fifty Shades Darker], taking on [a character] who’s completely unhinged. I saw her as a girl who’s grief-stricken and she just doesn’t have the tools to cope. Grief and heartbreak, it makes you do some pretty crazy things.

I think there is something about L.A., fortunately: once you get one role people think, ‘Oh well, someone employed her, so maybe we can.’ I mean, that’s my idea of it, anyway. ‘She can put one foot in front of the other and say a line.’

I collect skulls; I think that a beautiful skull is a really good gift for a guy.

I don’t come to work as an actor. There are many directors who can direct without ever having acted and do a great job and connect with their actors and lead them to excellent performances without themselves having had an acting background.

In my experience as a director, I think there is obviously something of the way men – maybe that’s a common point with Shirin – the way men see women in the film, and the way these two characters see each other.

I didn’t just see myself as a film director here [in Life And Nothing More], but also as an observer of people who had been condemned to death.

People have curiosity, they have intelligence, they have interest in understanding their peers. But producers and directors of cinema have decided that the seats in the theaters have been made to transform people’s minds to lazy minds.

I do think that we are sometimes, as directors, guilty of portraying or asking our actors to behave in certain ways that are perhaps not very morally acceptable. I’m not the only one.

Directors don’t always create, they can also destroy with too many demands.

Therefore, when you see the end result, it’s difficult to see who’s the director, me or them. Ultimately, everything belongs to the actors – we just manage the situation.

Close-Up is a very particular film in my oeuvre. It’s a film that was made in a very particular way; mainly because I didn’t really have the time to think about how to go about making the film.