I'm not good at confrontation. I know my strengths. I like company. And I am not a great arguer... I do find it much easier talking to people I like about things we both like.

Hollywood was possible for a while! Why didn't I go along with it? Well, the other things that were pulling me back were more important. Being at home, being in the same marriage, these things enabled me to go off and travel in the first place.

There is nothing better than playing a scene with John Cleese or Maggie Smith. It's electric. But I don't think I'm the sort of person who needs to have an outer ego in order to produce something. I realised that through the travel programmes.

I've never had a particular skill. I can't cook, dance, play an instrument, speak a foreign language. This used to worry me. I'd think, when I'm grown up, at 18, then I made it 21, it will be clear what role I should have in life. It never happened. I never signed on the dotted line as the sort of adult my father wanted.

I was very bad at projecting my voice. I used to do this Gumby Flower Arranging sketch which involved shouting, and I could never do it right, and at one point my voice went completely.

I saw novelists as being admirable people and I thought... I thought... maybe, one day, I could be one of them.

I always wanted to be an explorer, but - it seemed I was doomed to be nothing more than a very silly person.

There is barely a country in the world where you will be completely safe.

If you had a successful TV show, people wanted to see you live. Promoters had had practice with pop groups, and 'Python' achieved a similar status. We also had lots of rock star fans - George Harrison, Pink Floyd, Robert Plant. Promoters saw that and liked it.

There are people who travel because they want to push themselves to physical limits, people who walk across deserts or cycle across the Antarctic - like Ranulph Fiennes, who just does it because it's there. And then there are people like me, who are just genuinely curious about the world.

The trouble with travelling back later on is that you can never repeat the same experience.

I like to wake up each morning and not know what I think, that I may reinvent myself in some way.

I perceive and relate to the world through where I grew up; that's part of me. It's what I judge everything else against.

I try not to pay any attention to clothes fascism and I'd rather be thought of as someone who has his own sense of style.

My taste in watching things runs from dramas and low-budget films to high-end fantasy/science fiction.

A lot of the times when I've auditioned for parts in America, the answer is, 'Sorry, we need a bigger name.'

So, if they're coming in and having to do scenes that involve nudity or sexuality, in some way, the utmost important thing is that everyone feels comfortable and safe. If there's any gray area, that's going to be a problem.

I can be a lazy dresser.

The more you think that you are watching a show about sex, the more you ultimately are watching a show about the challenges of just connecting with human beings and being intimate.

Well, I think tone is very important with this show [Masters of Sex] because there are certain elements or certain aspects to the show that may be reminiscent of other shows. But, it really is a very new kind of show, in terms of the subject matter and the way it's being dealt with, and the fact that it's about real people and real events.

I get more satisfaction out of comedy stuff. I'm a laugh tart. I make no secret of that fact.

I've always dreaded the sea - in fact, I get terribly seasick.

In the last couple of weeks I have seen the ads for the Wonder Bra. Is that really a problem in this country? Men not paying enough attention to women’s breasts?

I'm horrible in the mornings. I'm grumpy.