“The thing I love about acting is that you can bring something very personal into the open and at the same time remain hidden because you’re always playing a character in a story that someone else has imagined. You’re always protected.”

I’ve gone on workout regimes, but I seem to have a system that is very resistant to changing.

Even today, England is a very repressed, repressive country, and there’s pressure to be kind of a certain way, so people do things that ultimately make them sad.

I love the characters I’ve had the opportunity to play.

What I notice about people who are gifted in filmmaking is that they’re great thinkers. They engage with big ideas and they engage with people.

I would have loved to have been a painter or a sculptor. I’m still fascinated by those things.

I am a typical Libran. I tend to see two sides of everything.

I’d like to have a go at directing.

When you have a character to work with, you carry them around in a strange way – they make you look at the world in a different way.

The criminal justice system, like any system designed by human beings, clearly has its flaws.

We are so mired in the complexity of our reactions to other people that when you come across someone who is asocial, there is a simplicity that is refreshing.

Filmmakers tell stories to explore human nature, which is always a flawed thing.

My intuition comes up with better stuff than my head, I think.

I’m really hopeless with technology – I don’t even have a computer.

I wish that the arts were better supported, and you can’t say that enough times, but I also believe that whatever happens, artists will keep going.

For me, it’s important to keep a level of anonymity.

I think that sometimes in theater, I don’t prepare much beyond going to the rehearsals.

How can you measure acting in inches?

I feel that one of the hardest things in acting is the way you need to switch your emotions.

My mom didn’t ever think I would take to acting because I was a very shy, very reserved kind of child. But obviously, something changed!

A successful film is a good film, and a non-successful film is a bad film. It’s as simple as that.

Well, my brother started acting before I did.

Every film for every actor is a make-or-break film. I believe every film has the power to break you or make you. So, an actor will treat every film like his last film.

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.

I never really wanted to write and wanted to focus on acting.