Colin Firth

Colin: My singing voice is somewhere between a drunken apology and a plumbing problem.

Colin: Before I was a father, I always had the rather juvenile attitude that everything I did in life was somehow undoable - that I didn't have to be absolutely 100 per cent committed to any of the things I said or did. I think that was an illusion because you are always committed to what you do - but, nevertheless, it was what I believed. But when you have a child, it becomes very clear that this is a part of you that will be with you for a lifetime - no matter what. You can't walk away from it. Or, if you do, then you do so at great cost.

Colin (talking about filming in Britain): I remember years ago in Tumbledown the camera was hidden in the roof of a supermarket on the King's Road. I had half my brain hanging out and was one-handedly wheeling myself across the road. Everyone pretended I didn't exist.

Colin: I absolutely don't care about my looks and I'm so used to them that I wouldn't change a thing. I would end up missing my defects.

Colin: I'm not patient, and some things drive me crazy. In my work, I get incredibly upset when people don't get it right or don't respect others' needs.

Colin: By the time you've reached your mid-forties as an actor, if you've done a few films there's always sex somewhere. You're lucky to make it through drama school without having to get your kit off. You get over it. You stop giggling about it.

Colin: If I want my career to go on, I'm going to have to find some more Fiennes brothers! However, any similarity between them basically stops at their last name. I was in no way reminded of Ralph by working with Joe. I got on fantastically with both of them. I have huge admiration for them as actors but I couldn't compare them.

Colin: Forget trying to be sexy. That's just gruesome.

Colin: ...I always thought the biggest failing of Americans was their lack of irony. They are very serious there! Naturally, there are exceptions... the Jewish, Italian, and Irish humor of the East Coast.

Colin: I have a kind of neutrality, physically, which has helped me. I have a face that can be made to look a lot better --or a lot worse.

Colin: The English people, a lot of them, would not be able to understand a word of spoken Shakespeare. There are people who do and I'm not denying they exist. But it's a far more philistine country than people think.

Colin: I was delighted to become a popular-culture reference point. I'm still delighted about it actually, and I still find it to be weird.