Quotes

I try to be quite a detailed actor. People were really picking up on that. Even if it was just a flicker of the eye or something, they got it.

You can spend a bit of yourself when you give yourself to a character. At the end of a job, you have to remind yourself who and what you are.

Live acting is a kind of adventure sport. I don't go abseiling or snowboarding, but I sometimes think that stepping out on stage can have the same kind of adrenaline rush.

I don't think actors need to go on pedestals. I don't buy it. I think it's a weird thing. It's like you become someone else, like stepping into another universe.

[on suffering an injury on the set of Spooks before his first audition for Thorin Oakenshield] I had taken so many painkillers that I hobbled into the room, sat on my hands and the whole meeting passed in a bit of a blur. If nothing else, I think, with my audition I may have succeeded in showing my ability to convey pain!

[on his professional quandary, as a six-foot-two actor, in playing Thorin, the Dwarf King] I think the biggest challenge for me is that when I walk into a room they think the wrong guy has come to the audition. It's a compliment, but on a business level it's difficult because it's hard to convince people it was really me playing the role.