Growing up, we used to watch a lot of 'Indiana Jones' and 'Star Wars' and wear hand-me-down jeans and jumpers. I wasn't really one for dresses.

I knew I wanted to be an actress, but I hadn't ever really told anyone. I'd always got quite good grades, so people assumed I would go and do a 'normal' job. My dad took me to my first audition for drama school and picked me up without anyone knowing, really.

I went to the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama, which was great but very different from a typical university. They sat us down in the first week and said: if you want to party, you've come to the wrong place. There was no lie-ins or skipping lectures.

I'm a tomboy and quite clumsy, so I'm more like the anti-sexy icon.

Without mincing words or really embellishing anything... I consider Mike Alsbury the renaissance man. He could do it all. He was an engineer. He was a pilot. He worked well with others. He had a great sense of humor. I never heard him raise his voice or lose his cool.

You can channel a lot within a comic framework, and I think 'The Guard' had a lot going on outside of the comedy, which is satisfying.

Nothing in man is more serious than his sense of humor; it is the sign that he wants all the truth.

When I was filming 'Premium Rush' in N.Y.C., I flew to L.A. to have a few general meetings. I sat down with Peter Cramer at Universal Studios and spoke about my life and career, and being that I'm such a goof, we spoke about how I really wanted to do a comedy next.