Acting is a very personal process. It has to do with expressing your own personality, and discovering the character you're playing through your own experience - so we're all different.

I'm an eccentric English actor, and there's a lot of us around.

I'm brilliant at cooking my stepmother's scrambled egg recipe. The secret is to put eggs, butter, milk, and seasoning together in the saucepan, and to keep stirring with a wooden spoon under a low heat until the preferred consistency is reached.

I am lucky, I don't have aches and pains. I do Pilates regularly, which is a series of stretching exercises, and I recommend it to anyone of my age because the temptation is not to exercise when you get older. Well, you should.

Before acting, I wanted to become a journalist. I also toyed with the idea of being a chef - but that's only when people asked me what I wanted to be. In fact, I always used to say I wanted to be an actor, but I didn't ever believe that I was good enough to be come one.

The whole atmosphere of the book, the tone of 'The Hobbit,' is of a kid's adventure story, told in the first person by Tolkien, who is introducing young people to the notion of Middle-earth. A lot of it is very light-hearted.

Godot is whatever it is in life that you are waiting for: 'I'm waiting to win the lottery. I'm waiting to fall in love'. For me, as a child, it was Christmas. At least that eventually came.

I have heard of people dying from prostate cancer, and they are the unlucky ones, the people who didn't know they had got it, and it went on the rampage.

In Singapore, Malcolm X type of activity would be extremely difficult because the government can be very harsh on lawbreakers.

I tend to discourage people from calling me 'Sir Ian,' because I don't like being separated out from the rest of the population. Of course, it can be useful if you're writing an official letter, like trying to get a visa or something passed through Parliament. They're impressed by these things.

People on television have trouble with fame because audiences think they're their mates.

When I went to lobby Nelson Mandela while the post-apartheid constitution was being drafted, I asked him to endorse making it illegal to discriminate on grounds of sexuality. I'd been warned that he might giggle if I mentioned homosexuality.

I've often thought the Bible should have a disclaimer in the front saying, 'This is fiction.'

When we'd suggested doing it, the Theatre Royal management had said, 'Nobody wants to see Waiting for Godot.' As it happened, every single ticket was booked for every single performance, and this confirmation that our judgment was right was sweet. Audiences came to us from all over the world. It was amazing.

I'm the sort of person who doesn't write in ink. I only write in pencil, so it can be rubbed out.

You mustn't upstage the bride.

'Macbeth' was a very lucky play for me.

Try and understand what part you have to play in the world in which you live. There's more to life than you know and it's all happening out there. Discover what part you can play and then go for it.

Macbeth is a very popular play with audiences. If you want to sell out a theater, just mount a production of Macbeth. It's a short play, it's an exciting play, it's easy to understand, and it attracts great acting.

Splendid architecture, the love of your life, an old friend... they can all go drifting by unseen if you're not careful.

Bill Gallagher's new version of 'The Prisoner' is an enthralling commentary on modern culture. It is witty, intelligent and disturbing. I am very excited to be involved.

There is a fantasy as old as the modern gay rights movement that if all our skins turned lavender overnight, the majority, confounded by our numbers and our diversity, and recognising a few of our faces, would at once let go of prejudice forevermore.

If I was on a march at the moment I would be saying to everyone: 'Be honest with each other. Admit there are limitless possibilities in relationships, and love as many people as you can in whatever way you want, and get rid of your inhibitions, and we'll all be happy.

In any human-rights campaign, everybody must do what they can.

That was the big effect Lord of the Rings had on me. It was discovering New Zealand. And even more precious were the people- not at all like the Australians.

I love the Broadway audiences, who relish live drama and don't hesitate to display their enthusiasm.

I don't have Gandalf the White's certainty about everything.

Personally, coming out was one of the most important things I've ever done, lifting from my shoulders the millstone of lies that I hadn't even realized I was carrying.

I don't really like being with people my own age for long periods, because all we talk about is our decrepitude, how the world is changing for the worse even though it isn't.

I'm not someone who wears shades all the time and ducks into a darkened car in case I'm recognized - that would be absolute misery.

'The Da Vinci Code' is the most popular book of our times.

It was wrongly assumed that I wished to become some sort of leader among gay activists, whereas in reality I was happier to be a foot soldier.

'King Lear,' I've been seeing all my life. I mean, the great actors of my lifetime... to join their company, as it were, by playing a part that's challenged them, is one of the great joys of being an actor who does the classics.

I got intrigued by working in small theatres.

There are some fantastic parts for older actors.

When I left Cambridge, I applied to regional repertory theaters in the U.K. and got accepted by one of them... And here I am, still at it.

The wonderful thing about modern medicine is that so many of these complaints that used to signify old age and decline can be coped with.

Tolkien is as good as Dickens at sketching a scene.

I get pretty grumpy about TV.

When I came out, I told my stepmother Gladys, and she just said she had known for years and was glad I wasn't lying anymore.

I often get mistaken for Dumbledore. One wizard is very much like another.

I don't make any distinction between a popular TV series or blockbuster film and doing Shakespeare. They're different, but as long as the material is good and the intention is honourable, it's all the same to me.

I headed out to have a breather at the stage door, dressed in my tramp costume. I had my bowler hat between my feet and there were passers-by, and one of them turned back and said, 'Do you need help, brother?' And $1 fell into my hat!

I don't think many people will re-read 'The Da Vinci Code.'

What I particularly like about Broadway is the camaraderie and the friendship of other people in other shows. Everybody knows you're opening and cares about you. There's a real village atmosphere.

You always think that 70 is the end of the road: 'Somebody died when they were 73; good life'. You're closer to death, and you better make sure you don't waste too much of your time doing things you don't want to do. No point in saying things you don't believe in.

Every anti-gay remark from the Church gives the thug a license to be cruel.

What's upsetting about an autobiography is that the final chapter is always missing. I mean, you want the death, don't you?

In the '50s and '60s, the life of a gay man was a secret. Homosexuality was illegal, so you didn't draw attention to yourself.

I certainly don't disparage someone whose attitude towards their work is utterly different from mine - that's up to them.