“I don’t honestly think people know what acting is.”

I would like to make it known, on this program, loud and clear, that I would absolutely embrace with all five of my arms being a Bond villain.

You cannot learn a lesson of profound forgiveness unless you understand what it is to be wounded and forgive that which has wounded you.

I’m open to any project, but my joyful projects are those through which I can say something and through which I can speak to the an audience of people in the world, and I can be that vehicle through which something can be said, I find that entirely thrilling and joyful.

The leaping Jaguar on the bonnet, to me, makes it look more like a hunter than something that is getting away. It’s a hunter. Richard III definitely would have had a chauffeur driven Jaguar MK X.

All the great writers root their characters in true human behaviour.

We are adjusters. We empathize, we change rhythm and above all we listen to our fellow actors-if they’re good actors.

They’re a very strange lot actors, very strange people.

The hierarchy of class in London was rigid. It was like a religion. It still is to a certain extent.

I honestly have no strategy whatsoever. I’m waiting for that script to pop through the letterbox and completely surprise me.

It’s Sir Ben. I’ve not been a Mister for two years.

You don’t go to a town to present the play and have applause at the end of it, but that’s benign conquest. It’s a glorious way of exploring other landscapes and other cultures in a very life-affirming way.

I’m convinced that had I not changed my name, I don’t think I would have had quite the same career curve that I eventually had.

One of the greatest things drama can do, at it’s best, is to redefine the words we use every day such as love, home, family, loyalty and envy. Tragedy need not be a downer.

Equal partners aren’t always what we envision as being manifestly equal. Equality can come in many different shapes and sizes and combinations.

I think that most actors attempt to keep in touch with the child.

My line-learning is very special. I like to learn the dialogue of the whole film before I arrive.

When a role for a young guy is being offered to me, I think of River Phoenix. It feels like a loss.

The good thing about acting is that it always keeps you on your toes. It’s not like any other job where you can go in and do the same thing as yesterday.

We supposed to be grown, but yet you still acting childish.

Men acquire a particular quality by constantly acting in a particular way.

The best thing about acting is that I get to lose myself in another character and actually get paid for it.

Acting is different from stand-up. It gives you this ability to enter into another character, to create another person.

I constantly find myself changing my mind all the time. One day, I want to do just acting and just that. One day I want to do music and just that.

I’m unconscious while I’m acting. I live the role and am not myself.