A lot of people are frightened by old age - by being around people who are, basically, on their way out - but I'm fascinated by it. It's an amazing thing to be around someone who has had a life well lived.

People had always vaguely mentioned that when you have children, how part of your life would stop. But they don't say that some other extraordinary part of your life opens up.

People tend to look great if they feel great.

Fine-tuning a play like 'Uncle Vanya,' which is already well-known to the people playing it, is not so much a verbal exercise as it is a visceral one.

That's why so many people want to play Hamlet: because it's a completely demarked role, and the actor playing it has to be prepared, through the language, to allow the audience to see into who he is.

You're always more critical of your own country. People will talk about stuff in Britain, and I'll go: 'Aw, it's not that bad,' but at home, it's different. It's inside you.

In my career, I thought I've never wanted to get anywhere in particular. I just wanted to work with interesting people on interesting projects.

I'm not interested in saying what people should and shouldn't do. It depends on how people feel about themselves. I suppose personally if you do anything out of fear or to mask who you are, then that's a bit scary. You've got to work with what you got....

With a role like Hedda Gabler, which is incredibly complicated, you often feel that you haven't even scratched the surface the first time around, so you relish the opportunity to do it again, particularly with an ensemble of actors and the company we assembled. But when you do that in films you somehow have to make some attempt to uncross people's arms and you have to justify why you're doing it.

I think the terrifying thing is you see all these people who go to the same cosmetic surgeon, and they end up, after a while, looking like everyone.

We're growing up with a very illiterate bunch of children who have somehow been taught that film is fact when, in fact, it's invention. Hopefully, an historical film will inspire people to go and read about the history but in the end it is a work of fiction and selection. As for the armour itself, no it wasn't particularly comfortable.

The emoji still doesn't really speak to the complexity that actually - or the subtext that goes on between when people actually speak face-to-face.

We change people's lives, at the risk of our own. We change countries, governments, history, gravity. After gravity, culture is the thing that holds humanity in place, in an otherwise constantly shifting and, let's face it, tiny outcrop in the middle of an infinity of nowhere

You can't be trying to make a film that pleases all people, you know, so it's not a concern of mine.

I often have a few scents depending on if I'm playing a character. The character may be wearing a scent that perhaps I wouldn't wear. We've all got different moods and ways we want to express ourselves; scent is a very powerful way to let people in to your secret life.

Audiences want to see them, and in fact, they earn money. The world is round, people.

A film is not a documentary. And what's wonderful about film is that it's a real provocation for people. I never, ever see film as being an absolute version of the truth.

It seems like people increasingly just can't be by themselves because they're so used to having an epicenter on the Internet that actually exists for other people. Until someone clicks onto your Facebook page, it doesn't mean anything.

I'm old enough to remember the days when you spoke to one person from one outlet and that was the conversation. But now what happens is you speak to people and what you say gets translated into Portuguese, then into Mandarin, through a German prism and then back into English and bears little to no resemblance between - to the exchange or - that you had initially with the journalist or to what you originally said.

People talk about the golden age of Hollywood because of how women were lit then. You could be Joan Crawford and Bette Davis and work well into your 50s, because you were lit and made into a goddess. Now, with everything being sort of gritty, women have this sense of their use-by date.

I think referendums are fantastic as long as the question is phrased in a way which is not meant to deliberately confuse or confound people.

I love strange choices. I'm always interested in people who depart from what is expected of them and go into new territory.

And perhaps, those of us in the industry who are still foolishly clinging to the idea that female films, with women at the center are niche experience, they are not. Audiences want to see them and, in fact, they earn money. The world is round, people.

I'm one of those strange beasts who really likes a corset.

I live my life parallel with my work, and they are both equally important. I'm always amazed how much people talk abpeoout celebrity and fame. I don't understand the attraction.

If I'm not good at acting, I'm not good at anything else.

Look, it's one of the great mysteries of the world, I cannot answer that question. I think I'm vaguely blonde. To be perfectly frank, I don't know.

It's part of my job. You can't play Veronica Guerin sounding like this. It just wouldn't wash. But what I find fascinating about doing an accent - unless it's a farce - is that it's not slapped on.

I'm a horrible person. And it's just coming out in my work.

I feel like I've been marinated in Australian theatre.

I certainly think that when I flick through all the magazines at the hairdresser's I like to see and am drawn to images that have an intelligence and mind at work behind them.

What I love about the theater is that you know who you're acting for: your audience. And the thing I find really hard in film is, you don't. The audience is invisible. And we're sitting there, hoping there's other people out there.

Things present themselves to you, and it's how you choose to deal with them that reveals who you are. We all say a lot of things, don't we, about who we are and how we think. But in the end it's your actions, how you respond to circumstance that reveals your character.

I have the embarrassing thing where often if you're watching a film, you kind of go through the emotions and the thought stages that your character went through, but you sort of do it with Tourette's. So I end up often crying when I'm crying, and looking angry when I'm looking angry, so it's pretty ugly

I'm not interested in playing characters who see the world through my prism. I think the journey of understanding any character is to see how they tick and how they differ from you.

o matter how much research you do, or invention you do, whether it's a character from a novel, a completely invented character or someone who actually existed, it's a work of faction. By the very fact you only have an hour and a half or two hours to tell a story, you're telescoping events and it is, in the end, a work of imagination.

I've got a funny old face. Someone described it once, and I think they were being kind, as character. But I know what they mean! I've never been that conventional. I suppose maybe it means that my face can look different in different lights, so I just try and sort of keep it simple when I'm going out, to still look like me.

I'm not particularly interested in playing characters that think the way I do.

I often have a few scents depending on if I'm playing a character. The character may be wearing a scent that perhaps I wouldn't wear. We've all got different moods and ways we want to express ourselves; scent is a very powerful way to let people in to your secret life.

There's an expression in Australia that's called 'Go Bush,' which means to get out of the city and relax. I try and 'go bush' to places where there's no cell reception. But, I don't get to do that often, so for the most part, it's just a state of mind.

I cook a mean Sunday lunch. My idea of Heaven is a lunch outside on a beautifully sunny Sunday afternoon. It's the time to gather everyone together.

Germany is a country that has absolutely had to since the Second World War ask itself massive moral questions. And it's reforged its identity based on culture. I mean, the amount of artists living and working in Berlin is unparalleled. It's one of the strongest economies, not only in Europe, but globally, and it's because of its understanding of the importance of culture.

It seems like people increasingly just can't be by themselves because they're so used to having an epicenter on the Internet that actually exists for other people. Until someone clicks onto your Facebook page, it doesn't mean anything.

Women have been doing very, very strange things for centuries. I mean ancient Egyptians were already doing that, but I don't necessarily judge people who do. I don't really think it makes people look better; they just look different.

I've got a funny old face. Someone described it once, and I think they were being kind, as character. But I know what they mean! I've never been that conventional. I suppose maybe it means that my face can look different in different lights, so I just try and sort of keep it simple when I'm going out, to still look like me.

I think marriage is all about timing. Getting married is insanity; I mean, it's a risk - who knows if you're going to be together forever? But you both say, 'We're going to take this chance, in the same spirit.

Yaron has elevated the way Australia perceives circus, both nationally and internationally ... I mean remarkable.

I admire the work of brilliant actresses such as Judi Dench, Maggie Smith and Helen Mirren, who have had such varied careers. They have never stopped working, and they are as great today as they ever were.

In my career, I thought I've never wanted to get anywhere in particular. I just wanted to work with interesting people on interesting projects.

When I emerged from drama school, I had no expectation that I would ever work in film.