Sometimes I've had to put myself on a diet.

I've learnt that through life you just get on with it. You're going to meet a lot of dishonest people along the line and you say good luck to them. I hope they live in comfort. Then I start sticking more pins in their effigies.

I never liked guns, I hate them, I always blink before they go off.

I'd occasionally do some exercises at home, but I never cared for gyms.

I was probably a little bit overweight as a child, being passionate about baked beans on toast and Cadbury's milk chocolate when I could get it.

Peter Sellers was a solitary character, always preferring to hide behind a mask, and consequently, you never really got to know the real Sellers.

When I was eight, an uncle, great uncle, gave a violin to me, and my father took me off to have lessons. After about six weeks, the violin teacher told my father he was wasting his money, wasting his time, and wasting my time, and it's one of my big regrets.

My parents adored me, and I had a very happy childhood, so maybe I just sort of expect to be loved.

Illness played a great - and unwelcome - role in my early life. Mumps were soon followed by a raging sore throat, and it was decided that I should have my tonsils removed and adenoids scraped at the same time.

My acting range has always been something between the two extremes of 'raises left eyebrow' and 'raises right eyebrow.'

When I was doing Bond, I was always being sent scripts to play the derring-do hero, with explosions going on all around.

No, I'm not at all adventurous. I'm terribly cowardly.

Sammy Davis Jr. was a real movie buff who loved nothing better than being around a film studio - whether he was working or not.

I'm a little devil.

Bond was escapism, but not meant to be imitated in real life.

I replaced Jim Garner in 'Maverick.' I replaced George Sanders in 'The Saint.' I've replaced everybody.

Practically everything I've been offered didn't require much beyond looking like me.

I believe it is better to be prepared for illness than to wait for a cure.

I spent my life playing heroes because I looked like one.

I am privileged to be at the right end of violins: not the end holding it but to listen to it.

'Skyfall' was marvellous, the best Bond film ever made.

I said I did not know enough about UNICEF to handle a press conference and she said they would not want to talk about it they would only want to talk about films.

It's no good being talented and not being in the right place at the right time.

Of course I am frustrated with regard to extreme poverty, to violence that never seems to cease.

Learning a play is one thing, but to learn to play Vivaldi's 'Four Seasons' without music: that's brilliant.

Over the next two years UNICEF will focus on improving access to and the quality of education to provide children who have dropped out of school or who work during school hours the opportunity to gain a formal education!

It's wonderful to travel with somebody that you love and we never travel anywhere without one another.

I got out of this school and went to Camberwell College of Arts, a terribly prestigious thing to do. I was there to be a painter. And I sketched so well that, a year later, I was sent to Slade School of Fine Art, one of the great art schools.

I directed Bebe Neuwirth in 'Here Lies Jenny' at the Post Street Theatre. I was gobsmacked - the audiences were extremely knowledgeable, affectionate, interested, and not cynical.

When it was announced I had won the Tony Award, I was in Bangkok doing a movie with Judi Dench. I remember coming back from the location to the Oriental Hotel and hearing someone yelling across the reception area, 'You've won the Tony!' It was wonderful and strange to be halfway around the world.

So, suddenly I was an actor. I don't remember being nervous. I learned to be nervous later.

Everything happens every night for this audience, and it's a very special occasion to come to the theatre.

We did a black 'Julius Caesar' in which the predominant accent was Caribbean. This offends many people, you know. I also had a Chinese Marc Anthony. I also managed - this caused a great shock - I also got some white guys in it as well!

More people saw me in one episode of 'Cheers' than would ever see me in a play.

In the Victorian age, actors played Romeo until they were 60 or 70 years old.

Sometimes the most excruciating experiences in rehearsals and performances yield the most beautiful work.

I'm really interested in the form, putting one piece up against another and finding something corroborative in another voice. I've done a lot of that.

Most of my enjoyable times in the theater have been working in a group.

The classical actor in England makes roughly the equivalent of a bus driver.

It doesn't seem Shakespeare works if you turn him into a religion.

In Tom Cone's work nothing is easy.

I want to play King Lear, Macbeth, Benedict, Coriolanus. I wouldn't mind doing Hamlet again. Well, I'm a little old. Perhaps I can rub Vaseline on the audience's eyes.

'Merry Wives of Windsor' is a wonderful machine. It's one of the great farces, and it's astonishing to remember that this is written by the same man who wrote 'Hamlet,' 'The Taming of the Shrew' or 'Cymbeline.' It's so similar, and yet the form is so different.

I usually played comic lovers or losers - weak, ineffectual men.

The whole point is it's about getting as many people to come and see the play as you can.

People very often say to actors that they admire their careers, and I rather think that what's implied by that is that we have a choice in the matter. When really, most actors, me included, do whatever comes along next.

Now, of course, we know there has been an end to apartheid in South Africa, but what excited me was seeing it in the context of history.

You may be modest and un-egotistical in your life; I'm quite ordinary. But I play big egotistical parts.

I used to be the voice of Virgin Atlantic in America, and some people only know me for that.

I have a little studio in Chinatown, and I sometimes go there and rearrange my brushes. But I would have to stop acting altogether in order to become a painter. At the moment, I'm still interested and active as an actor and director. Besides, I rather think acting and painting are all part of the same creative urge.