My dad was a master butcher and I trained to be a butcher when I left school. I didn't enjoy it at the time but I love cooking now, so perhaps I would have been a chef.

Acting meant so much to me.

Am I a household name? I still can't get my head around that.

Britain's a funny place and there's a lot of funny people coming out of there and a lot of people are finding mediums to express themselves.

By the time you've been single for quite a long time, you can get quite specific about what you can and can't put up with.

I can pretty much say all of us know when 'Downton' is going to end. This is a show with a finite life.

I had to escape the destruction of my father's bankruptcy and all that difficulty.

I see myself as a performer and that applies to a Greek drama or a modern comedy.

I think great humor lies in playing the truth of a situation.

I think great humor lies in playing the truth of a situation. I see myself as a performer and that applies to a Greek drama or a modern comedy.

I took a gamble in becoming an actor and my dream job has been realised.

I'd seen a play of 'Richard III' in Coventry when I was 15, which sowed the seeds that you could act for a living.

I'm more rooted in new plays and new writing.

I'm single, I'm looking for something meaningful.

It's not something that's at the forefront of my mind, but I think I'd regret it if I didn't have children.

The qualities I am looking for in Miss Right are intelligence and humour.

You get a lot of people requesting photographs but I tend to keep myself to myself, pull my cap down.

I left school at 16 but I wish I'd gone to university - I think I would have studied English literature. I had a knack for that. But I don't think you have the kind of wisdom at 16 to make that decision.

I think with Sky and BBC Three and Channel 4, there are some great television platforms, and the stand-up movement in this country is phenomenal. It's like rock n' roll here. Britain's a funny place and there's a lot of funny people coming out of there and a lot of people are finding mediums to express themselves.

I would have loved to have been a footballer like my great uncle Matt Busby, but I knew quite early on that I wasn't going to make the grade. Luckily I was told by the age of 13 that I wasn't good enough. That's not a bad thing. You see this 'X Factor' generation of kids now who don't accept that they're not good enough.