“I’m interested in art for all. I don’t want it to be only the sons and daughters of Tory MPs who get to see my plays.”

I genuinely don’t know Julian Assange well. To authenticate an opinion, I really would have to meet him.

I think anyone who works in medicine has superpowers.

Kevin Feige said to me: “I don’t think we’ve ever put an actor through quite as much as this, physically and mentally.” I’ll wear that as a badge of honour. It was endless.

I tend to have a cup of tea, try to stop worrying about what I did wrong, cool down and will the audience back in as soon as possible.

Sherlock [Holmes] is on the side of the angels, but don’t think he’s one of them. He uses similar means, but it seems to be for a better purpose, one would hope.

The more charming person is the person who admits the other person is more charming.

Fame is a weird one. You need to distance yourself from it. People see a value in you that you don’t see yourself.

I was the boy that turned a girlfriend into the most celebrated lesbian on television. I got so much stick for that.

If you can’t jump on board when the ride’s going past that’s it, it usually goes by, so the hugest compliment they paid me was to come back to me. It motivated me to try to fulfill their faith.

People’s hands fascinate me. It’s tempting to look at a businessman’s left hand and see if there’s an indentation from a missing wedding ring. Or maybe there’s a tan line and the skin is pressed down where’s he’s worked a ring off his finger.

I can’t stop traffic on Fifth Avenue, not unless I walk in front of an oncoming cab.

I feel that TV and film feed off each other well. It’s more in the perception of the viewer than it is of the actor.

I’d love to do a noir. I think Steve McQueen is so cool. But a classic film is a classic film, and perhaps the fantasy of being those characters should be left alone. You’re treading on very thin ice.

I haven’t done period dramas back-to-back, or really anything back-to-back. You get asked to do what you’re most recently famed for, so I’m careful of not repeating myself.

If you have an over-preoccupation with perception and trying to please people’s expectations, then you can go mad.

Being a posh actor in England you cannot escape the class-typing from whatever side you look at it.

I’m a Batman fan from Day 1. My daughter’s favorite is Wonder Woman, and my son loves The Flash, Cyborg, and Superman.

Although lynchings have steadily increased in number and barbarity during the last twenty years, there has been no single effort put forth by the many moral and philanthropic forces of the country to put a stop to this wholesale slaughter.

The soul in its nature loves God and longs to be at one with Him in the noble love of a daughter for a noble father.

I want to be here for a long time, so I am going to do everything I have to do to be here. And I want to walk my daughter down the aisle and give her away to somebody some day.

When I started my ministerial job I brought my daughters into the Department, due to last-minute childcare complications.

It’s a merger of home life and work life. They aren’t that separate, I must confess, and my daughters know an awful lot about childcare reform now because of it.

I’ll never forget the time my mother showed up with her best friend and two daughters, and all four of us dressed up in matching clothes, shoes and hats to go pick up my brother from school.

It’s the moms who are overaggressive. A lot of times their daughters are very sweet and cordial, and the moms tend to grab you and scream and want to kiss you.