I'm never bored, never ever bored. If I've got a day off I'll sit in a cafe and watch and observe. I'm a great observer.
David Suchet
A successful swindler has to be a great salesman even more than a great actor.
That's the thing about film acting and television acting. You just release yourself and do what is true for the moment, and ignore everybody and everything and all the technical razzmatazz that goes on.
I think it's very dangerous, the idea of celebrity - you have to be constantly controversial to maintain the status of celebrity. Reality TV is the death of entertainment - it's just mindless TV but popular because of its voyeuristic nature, and people are very voyeuristic.
Although I'm a very emotional man, I just can't have blind faith; I have to find out for myself.
I've always been short and stocky. So when I got into repertory theatre after graduation, I found myself doing character roles: because of my deep voice, shape and height, I was playing 40-year-old, 50-year-old roles at the age of 23.
When I was 16, I made some little 35mm documentaries about the poor in London. I went round Notting Hill, which was a real slum in the 1950s, shooting film.
When I was 18 and not sure whether I wanted to be an actor, I realised that a playwright has no voice without an actor. That's my reason for acting: to get that character as right as possible for my writer. And I have never changed my philosophy.
I'm really into my photography and am trying to catch up with digital generation - I was used to the old 35mm cameras.
I love music, especially classical like Verdi; it's a great way to relax.
I don't really want people to see me. I'm not into stardom.
I became fascinated by the fact that people write to give away rather than write to be read. It's the difference between playwrights and novelists.
I'd love to be remembered as a character actor who brought illumination to roles in wonderful plays and who delivered performances that made people think and rethink those roles.
The joy of my career is I've been very blessed to be able to be an actor in major films, television, theater, and also British radio. In fact, my dream as an actor when I started out was to be able to work in all the media. Thankfully, that's what I'm being given to do.
When you're doing characters from famous novels, you have a responsibility as an actor to make it what the writer intended. And then you add and expand from there to create a three-dimensional performance.
I'm not an evangelist Christian at all. I can't try to convert anybody. It's not in me to do that. But my faith has given me such an appreciation of people and meaningful relationships, and a world view which I didn't have before. And although I will fail every day, it gives me something to aspire to.
I was a typical teen growing up in the 1960s, when everybody was into gurus and meditation.
Inevitably, every part an actor plays contains some of himself.
I'm 64 years old, and I've been acting now for 42 years. Only recently have I thought to myself, 'Hmmm, it may be interesting to start directing.'
I suppose I could be accused of taking acting too seriously and losing the fun of it. I do take my work very seriously; I take on the responsibility of it.
I'm really not interested in showing me or playing me. My gift as an actor, given to me, is to be able to become other people.
I would have liked to do more big movies. And the reason I say that is not because I want to be a star, but what I would have liked to have done is reached a different audience with my work.
I'm three-quarters Russian, so I've always felt an outsider. But I don't think you can be in a play with John Of Gaunt's 'This sceptred isle' speech and not feel proud to be British.
When I was 16, I played Macbeth at school and my English teacher said, 'I think you may have acting talent. Try to get into the National Youth Theatre of Great Britain and see where you get.' I wouldn't have thought of that at all. I wanted to be a surgeon, but I wasn't a clever man.
Deep inside, I am desperate to do comedy.
