“The best research for playing a drunk is being a British actor for 20 years.”

Do I believe in God? Yes I do. When you’ve had a life like mine, you have to.

Funny things happen to you in movies for silly reasons.

As an actor, my attitude towards using of film versus digital is, if you have film, filmmakers have to cut eventually so you don’t have to learn all that dialogue. With digital, they can just go on forever and it’s a nightmare. So, I like film – nice short takes.

My understanding of women goes only as far as the pleasures.

Don’t sit as if you have nothing to say. You should be bursting with things to say. You just choose at this particular place and time, not to say them.

I’m the audience’s representative on earth.

Do you know that the harder thing to do and the right thing to do are usually the same thing? Nothing that has meaning is easy,”Easy” doesn’t enter into grown-up life.

The trouble with women? Elbows.

I’ve had such a great time, I’d like to come back as me – and do it all over again.

I always exposed the weakness rather than the nastiness.

A man should dress in a way that you don’t notice. He looks good and you don’t know why. But it’s the tailoring, the materials, and the clothes.

I have never seen it but by all accounts it is terrible. However, I have seen the house that it built and it is terrific.

Anyone can write. But comedy, you’ve got to do some writing. You get one comedy script to every 20 dramas.

Save your money. You’re going to need twice as much money in your old age as you think.

You’ve got to be flexible. Directors do a massive amount of planning and homework, and if after all that your director decides to throw it all out of the window and shoot spontaneously, then you must follow his lead.

Some men aren’t looking for anything logical, like money. They can’t be bought, bullied, reasoned, or negotiated with. Some men just want to watch the world burn.

It’s cruel to compare two actors working with two different filmmakers on two different characters.

You have to trust your instincts. There is a moment when an actor has it, and he knows it.

Don Siegel last advice to me was ‘Don’t short yourself.’ He said the tendency is when an actor’s directing is to kind of you want to work on everybody else but you’re going to short yourself. He said, take the time to do a good job with yourself so that you’re satisfied with it.

A star on a movie set is like a time bomb. That bomb has got to be defused so people can approach it without fear.

In other words, I wouldn’t like to be an actor if I could only be real. I like to get wild, behaviourally wild, and it’s crazy to think of any form where it’s just one way.

Frankly, I got into the movies because I like the movies a lot.

I want to be an actor, I am just not very comfortable talking about myself.

I have no idea what I’m doing, and that’s kind of how I love it.