The way I relax is I think, 'I haven't got anything coming up.' I like to know there are months ahead when I've got nothing.

I felt my mother about the place. I don't think she haunts me, but I wouldn't put it past her.

I was always someone who lived in the future all the time, it was always the next thing - dreams of escape.

Sixty felt like a big landmark. Not in a dreadful sense, but none of the other birthdays have bothered me. It's got labels on it - OAP, retirement - and I just wanted to take stock. I wanted to be in my greenhouse at home and at least give myself the opportunity of not working again.

My dad and one brother are working the farm. They laughed when I said I wanted to act. We work very hard, but for my family, it's just another experience in life, y'know?

My parents were both born in 1930. They grew up during the Depression. They wanted their children to have secure lives, to have a good salary and a pension plan. If I could've guaranteed that I'd be a best-selling writer, that would've been one thing, but nobody could say that. So I knew better than to say that was ambition.

I grew up in Tuscany in a very poor family. My father was a farmer and my mother was a farmer, but, my childhood was very good. I am very grateful for my childhood, because it was full of gladness and good humanity.

I always quit at three when my kids come home from school so I feel pretty spoiled.