Quotes

I was only on set for a week, but I learnt so much. What I noticed about The Dark Knight Rises was how high the stakes are - how important it is that you get it right. There's not a lot of mucking around or laughing and joking as there are on some other types of job, it's a very high stakes set and that's exactly how it should be, because there's a lot riding on it.

If I had to pick one single thing, it would be acting for camera. That's what I've always absolutely loved. When I did my first telly role in 1995, I kind of realised that was where my heart lay. But as an actor, unless you're very lucky or you evolve in a certain way, you have to move around to keep working. I've had a lovely and varied stage career, but perhaps now at 40 it doesn't fill me with as much excitement as my other ventures.

I've got nine tattoos, I'm 5'6", I'm Glaswegian and I'm stocky. In film you tend to work in the area you look like, and since I left Mountview (Theatre School) at 24, every so often I've played these darker roles. Thugs, drug dealers, wife beaters, junkies, whatever, so it's not an area I'm unfamiliar with!

Even though I was doing all the singing and dancing, at the back of my mind I wanted to do straight acting.

"I got on like a house fire with Noomi Rapace, which is funny when you consider most of my scenes involved rolling around the floor or throwing her over a table or her battering me with an iron.

Things started to change a couple of years ago when I did Silent Witness playing head of security for Russian gangsters in London. It was the first time I'd been on screen in a suit and clean shaven. Then last year I got the call to play the headteacher in iBoy.

On his appearance in 2017 Sci Fi thriller 'What Happened To Monday'. "I got on like a house on fire with Noomi (Rapace) despite the fact most of my scenes with her involved rolling around the floor with her, throwing her through a table or her battering me in the face with an iron.''

On his musical theatre training and appearances in West End musicals. "Even though I was doing all this singing and dancing at the back of my mind I was bored and really wanted to be a TV and film actor.''

On his appearance with Gerard Butler in the stage version of 'Trainspotting' (1996). "Basically I thought I was too small to play Begbie because I'm only 5'7'' (just!) and Gerry was playing Renton and the big man is 6'2 at least! I was told in no uncertain terms that my height gave me all the menace I needed and I got the part.