Actor

If people want to know who I am, it is all in the work.

The directors you trust the most are the ones, when you ask them a question, they've got the guts to say, 'I don't know.'

I do feel more myself in America. I can regress there, and they have roller-coaster parks.

Maverick is a word which appeals to me more than misfit. Maverick is active, misfit is passive.

I'm still living the life where you get home and open the fridge and there's half a pot of yogurt and a half a can of flat Coca-Cola.

I'm a quite serious actor who doesn't mind being ridiculously comic.

I have every sympathy for writers. It's a mystery to me what they do. I can edit. I can cross out and say, 'I'm not saying that' or, 'How about we move this to here? Wouldn't that make that bit of the story better?' But where any of it comes from is beyond me. I will never write a play or a novel.

In theater, you've got to be aware of your whole body because it involves stamina. It involves two-and-a-half hours and a sustained release of energy, maybe for six months.

The audience should feel like voyeurs. Their response is absolutely crucial.

I am the character you are not supposed to like.

What's interesting about the process of acting is how often you don't know what you're doing.

If you could build a house on a trampoline, that would suit me fine.

If only life could be a little more tender and art a little more robust.

Older people say, 'Oh I loved you in 'Sense and Sensibility,' and that's the only film they want to talk about. Equally, there are people who only want to talk about 'Galaxy Quest.' And there's a whole bunch of teenagers who only want to talk about 'Dogma.'

I always feel that when I come to Edinburgh, in many ways I am coming home.

I have just returned from the dubbing studio where I spoke into a microphone as Severus Snape for absolutely the last time.

Talent is an accident of genes - and a responsibility.

Market forces impose certain rules before a film can actually get made.

Who I am gets in the way of people looking innocently at the parts I play.

There's a voice inside you that tells you what you should do.