Colin Firth

I think that, often, actors represent what they're not. You get people who define the aristocracy who are not aristocratic - they're lower-middle class or working class. An awful lot of your so-called angry young actors have grown up in extreme bourgeois comfort. It really is surprisingly common. ”

Forget trying to be sexy. That's just gruesome. ”

Bridget Jones is part of literary lore now and actually to be a part of it is enormously flattering. ”

I do think I'm a character actor. ”

I haven't had to struggle very much. I haven't paid my dues. I think I have been lucky. ”

In this case it appealed to me partly because it felt close to me in some ways. This is about a confused, bewildered middle class Englishman adrift in smalltown America and that has definitely been me. ”

My looks aren't something that come dazzlingly through in everything I do. I can be made to look one way or the other fairly easily... I am still not recognised on the street that much. ”

To be bothered wherever you go - it's not a rational thing to want at all. ”

I have a kind of neutrality, physically, which has helped me. I have a face that can be made to look a lot better - or a lot worse. ”

I was in a lake in 'Love Actually', and I was attacked by some hideous aquatic beast and was rushed to the hospital by a man named Rafael! Something stung my elbow, and it blew up to the size of a tennis ball. ”