At first, I simply wanted to get a basic understanding of sign language, but as time went on, I really got the bug and wanted to become proficient so that I could make good use of my skills.

I'm hoping I can fill a gap by helping to advise people on acting mechanics - the kinds of things that, looking back, I would have really benefited from as a teenager.

It's really important to remember that disability is diversity, and that disabled actors and disabilities are something that is hugely under-represented in film.

I've done my fair share of fundraising over the years, and I know how difficult that can be, so I could only imagine people's reaction when I was asking them to part with their hard-earned cash for a movie.

We have a large underclass in Britain, and a fairly low standard of education. Our best universities are extremely good, but a very significant proportion of the British population that comes out of compulsory schooling with very low standards of education.

You can learn from everyone, the president or the cleaner. You need teachers in life, but they're not always school teachers or professors. You learn from ordinary people. You learn from travel, from just walking down the street.

I like books steeped in the quotidian - details about work and place. You can learn how to run a chicken-and-waffle restaurant by reading 'Mildred Pierce.' And I like fiction about money.

Not only does neoliberalism undermine both civic education and public values and confuse education with training, it also treats knowledge as a product, promoting a neoliberal logic that views schools as malls, students as consumers, and faculty as entrepreneurs.