Auction houses run a rigged game. They know exactly how many people will be bidding on a work and exactly who they are. In a gallery works of art need only one person who wants to pay for them.

It's art that pushes against psychological and social expectations that tries to transform decay into something generative that is replicative in a baroque way that isn't about progress and wants to - as Walt Whitman put it - 'contain multitudes.'

Good management is the art of making problems so interesting and their solutions so constructive that everyone wants to get to work and deal with them.

In a decaying society art if it is truthful must also reflect decay. And unless it wants to break faith with its social function art must show the world as changeable. And help to change it.

Leadership is the art of getting someone else to do something you want done because he wants to do it.

The reason why I love people and writing about them is because they don't always respond with hate and anger. If they did I wouldn't have a story to tell. Who wants to know about someone who was brutalised and became brutal? I'm interested in the exceptions.

Gary Ross is amazing. He's just - he always has a billion ideas of what he wants but has a very clear perspective also he just makes it work. He really does. He's trying different things and making everything look amazing.

Listen a cable series is a beautiful thing because there's such amazing writing happening on television and it's a schedule that allows you to do a play or two. There's a reason everybody wants that job!

And you can't complain about kissing Emma Watson. Isn't that what everyone in the world wants to do? I've known Emma for a few years. She's this amazing capacity of young and vibrant and brilliant but also a bright intelligent old soul.

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.