Chiwetel Ejiofor

Since I started acting, I always or often find work takes precedence with me. And that is not necessarily a great rule for life. ”

As a child, I was just never that interested in the lives of my favourite actors, like Cary Grant. I do wonder whether knowing too much about someone's personal life interrupts an audience's ability to suspend disbelief, to really invest in the characters. My preference would always be that people engage with the work. ”

The idea of making a film - a film that I had certainly never seen before - about the slave experience was a huge responsibility. It's a project that requires a wider understanding of the geopolitical nature of the slave trade, of historical and modern-day racism. ”

From deep in the slave hut is somebody calling over 150 years to all of our experiences and all of our ideas on human respect, and all of our ideas on dignity. And I felt like that's just incredibly powerful. ”

I've always been a believer in research. It's great to have an instinctual human reaction to a character, too, of course, but it has to be countered with knowledge and understanding. ”

London and L.A. are both places I feel I can call home. It's a nice balance of Californian calm and that slightly more engaged, electric London vibe that I've always loved. ”

I wanted to be an actor ever since I got on stage for the first time, aged 13. Before that, I thought I might follow in the medical footsteps of my parents: my father was a doctor, my mother a pharmacist. ”

I was probably 14 or 15 when I was first on stage at school doing 'Measure for Measure.' I immediately felt it was a great way of expressing oneself at a moment when I didn't think I could express myself, really. I suddenly had access to this range of emotions and thoughts and feelings that were there in me. I was surprised by that. ”

I think when I was doing 'Amistad,' I was just too young to really understand what the process was, and beyond that, I hadn't really got involved. It was just somehow - and I thought that the artistry was all in the theater. ”

We always want to live in an environment where there's no artificial block to good work. ”