Quote

As an actor there are times when you're sitting around and wishing you were working, so you've got to just take it when it comes.

I think anytime you can do something you haven't seen or done in a film before, it's always a great day as an actor.

When you get to work with people like Ian McKellen or directors like Peter Jackson, you sit and watch.

You can get a bit world-weary in this job, and 'The Passion' reminded me of what a fantastic job acting is and how lucky I am to be doing it.

When it's working, what acting is really about is getting into the essence of a moment in a creative, joyous way - through whatever frees you up.

I understand, certain scenes have to have a lot of takes. As an actor, I think it's quite nice to have a handful of takes, because you don't want to do it once or twice; I think once or twice sometimes is quite terrifying because you don't really feel like you've given them what you want.

I started being interested in acting when I heard the voices of Sir Laurence Olivier and Sir John Gielgud and Sir Alec Guinness. I've had the great privilege of working with Sir Derek Jacobi and Sir Anthony Hopkins. These are people who inspire the work that I do.

A good director's not sure when he gets on the set what he's going to do.

That is one of the reasons one enjoys acting. Now and again, you get scenes where you work with somebody really good and you have a good time trying to make it really work and really work well.

As an actor, I like as much time with the material as possible and given the opportunity, time spent with the other actors in the scene. But that is a rare luxury in working in any TV series.