One of my great regrets, and I don't have many, is that I spent too long putting people's status and reputation ahead of their more important qualities. I learned far too late in life that a long list of letters after someone's name is no guarantee of compassion, kindness, humour, all the far more relevant stuff.
Bill Nighy
When it comes to casual clothing, my enthusiasm for clothes starts to waver.
The phenomenon of vampires has always appealed to me. Everyone kind of likes a vampire story because it almost could be true.
Never go anywhere you have to wear brown shoes.
The way the elderly are treated, and in some cases warehoused and medicated, rather than nurtured and listened to, is distressing.
I don't do plays without jokes anymore. I've retired from those plays. I think it's bad manners to invite people to sit in the dark for two and a half hours and not tell them the joke.
I find it hard to relax around any man who's got the second button on his shirt undone.
If I ruled the world, every woman would have a Chanel suit in her wardrobe.
I'm a jacket man. And if I'm without one, I am kind of seriously disabled. I don't know how to operate in shirt sleeves.
I have a perfectly average skewed perception of myself. We often don't know what we're like.
I've never been a great enthusiast about how I look and I am very... when I was young I had a real anti-talent for inventing myself as unappealing - craven and unremarkable.
When a movie is called 'searingly honest,' it's almost invariably grim and demonstrates how bad things can get.
There is something, yeah, I mean traditionally it's more fun to play bad guys than it is good guys and when you're playing a bad guy, yeah, the fun in it is to see how scary you can be, how horrible you can be. And it's surprising what you come up with.
I don't even own a car.
You get older and you see yourself and say, 'God, he's old, who's that?'
Anyone who can do the splits and come back up on the backbeat, as James Brown and Prince can, has my eternal respect. Prince, who is a genius of the highest order, can come back up while singing and playing the guitar.
I'm always happy when actors get rich, because the odds on it are so long!
One of the reasons I like a suit is because I've never been that keen on my body. The shape a suit presents is always going to be better than anything I can do.
I did pick up a guitar once, but the strings hurt my fingers so I put it down again.
One of the things that is assumed about actors is that they are extrovert, which is almost never the case, in my experience.
Emma Watson is adorable in the extreme. She is such a lovely person.
I don't seem to be able to learn from experience or anything useful. History doesn't help me. Precedents don't inform my experience.
It can't be overstated how wonderful it is not to have to audition any more. Any actor will tell you, it's like Christmas.
The great thing about animation is it's like the radio. I used to do lots of radio when I was a kid, and you get to play parts you would never get to play ordinarily.
I got briefly mistaken for someone who might be good in bed, which was very, very good.
I wanted to be a journalist, I thought it was glamorous and that I'd meet beautiful women in the rain.
I'm not a financial expert. The Robin Hood tax seems to me a very simple and beautiful idea. I don't see the problem.
I've always slightly worried the kids who play football around my house. They know I'm an actor, but felt sorry for me because they'd never seen anything I've done.
There are only three men in the world who are licensed to wear shorts: Brad Pitt, Johnny Depp and Tom Cruise.
I think in the old days, everybody used to act really quickly because Hollywood was built by theatre people.
I have nothing against romanticism. I'm all for it. I'm helpless in the face of romance.
In life, if you have an enthusiasm for what they call 'good manners,' sometimes people don't quite believe you. I've had that once or twice before, where they assume you can't be for real.
Jerry Bruckheimer says that he makes films that he would want to see, and it seems that that coincides with what a lot of people want to see.
It's probably healthier to find fame later in life.
When you have a family, or even when you're just seeing a girl, it's difficult to be skint.
If you ever see me in a social setting wearing any sort of sportswear, then you know I'm in crisis.
If you are supposed to be villainous and have some sort of agenda, I like the idea of delivering that kind of character in a perfectly well-mannered way.
I guess part of the hit-man appeal is the solitude. Everybody is lured to the idea of the solitary life.
I speed up past mirrors.
When you've been going on about something for a while, it is always satisfying to discover that other people agree with you.
I don't want to associate myself with any specific group of politicians.
Actors always talk about taking their work home and I always think: 'What are you on? You just turn it off. You are at work and then you go home.'
I don't dislike the process of animation... I find it daunting, but only as much as I find everything daunting.
Hunger is almost like something the West does. It's almost like the direct result of the way the West performs.
I never watch my own films.
When I do a play, it's like agreeing to be ill for a couple of months.
I know really, really famous people who are terrified every time they walk on to a stage.
I'm one of those weird people who doesn't even own a computer.
I've worked with Len Wiseman before, on the 'Underworld' series, in which I was a vampire. The first two of those were his first two films. And I admire him beyond measure. I think he's tremendous, as a man and as a director.
I like sci-fi.
