I am better able to imagine hell than heaven it is my inheritance I suppose.

I think films about men are often about characters who don't want to express their feelings. You're supposed to kind of admire them for not expressing their feelings. And I feel that's a bit dull. Women's stories often have stronger emotional content which I enjoy doing. What I really love doing is mixing that with humor.

The thing about For Better or Worse is the only thing that made me an okay director for that is that I have a sense of humor and it was supposed to be funny.

I suppose I look for humor in most situations because it humanizes things it makes a character much more three-dimensional if there's some kind of humor. Not necessarily laugh-out-loud type of stuff just a sense that there is a humorous edge to things. I do like that.

I suppose I miss the British cynicism and the humor.

I suppose if I'd got a brilliant first and done research I might still be a don today but I hope not. People become dons because they are incapable of doing anything else in life.

I kind of call myself an atheist I suppose - although quite a spiritual atheist I hope.

There is something uniquely depressing about the fact that the National Portrait Gallery's version of the Barack Obama 'Hope' poster previously belonged to a pair of lobbyists. Depressing because Mr. Obama's Washington was not supposed to be the lobbyists' Washington the place we learned to despise during the last administration.

I'm just like so many women - I was frustrated I had these white pants that I had spent a lot of money on and you get home and you think 'What am I really supposed to wear under this?' So it was a frustrated consumer moment.

I think I'm becoming more relaxed in front of a camera. I suppose I'll always feel slightly more at home on stage. It's more of an actor's medium. You are your own editor nobody else is choosing what is being seen of you.