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I'm a sucker for period pieces. There is always great opportunity for research and to delude yourself into feeling like you are in a different time and place.

We tend to do period stuff because it helps make it one step removed from boring everyday reality.

I come from theater, and doing period stuff is so whimsical and imaginative and so outside any frame of reference than I have ever had so I prefer that just in terms of fun factor.

When I do period work, I really like to read about the period as much as I like to look at pictures because sometimes the written word is much better at conveying what their lives were really like and how much they had and where their clothes came from. Because, a lot of time, people dressed in their Sunday best to pose for a picture.

Sometimes when you're working on a period piece, there's this tendency to be nostalgic about the period and do everything superglamorous, which can end up looking cliche.

I'm always nervous taking on a period role because it's difficult to research - you can't observe it, go out and see it. But it's satisfying because eventually you think, 'I got there.'

What you have to understand about period drama is that it's 'history light.'

Any period is fascinating: the more ancient, the better.

I've never done a period piece. That's something I'd be really interested in doing.

Sometimes you have a period piece where you have to research around it but, if the writers have done their homework well enough, the information is all in the script.