I've always been into dark colours.
I had a great drama teacher, and he sort of made out drama school as this incredibly difficult thing to get into: 6,000 people apply every year, and some of the schools only have 12 places. It's a phenomenally difficult thing to get into. And that excited me - I wanted that challenge.
I spend a lot of time in L.A., and I think it would probably be easier if I lived there work wise, but there's no city like London, there is so much going on. I can jump on the Tube and be anywhere in 20 minutes, and all my friends and family are here and I'm not prepared to give that up.
I'm not scared of animals, except for rats. I'll break down in tears if I see a rat!
You can be the best actor in the world, but if you don't have that one lucky moment, it kind of doesn't matter. There are a lot of amazing actors who will never get the chance to prove themselves because they won't have that one lucky moment.
All actors have to change their name.
I think camping is one of those things where if you're forced into it as a child, you'll probably hate it as an adult.
For work, I have to be living in cities, I really cherish the time when I get to be out in the countryside.
Nearly every taping or audition has to be in an American accent, so you don't have a choice; you just have to get good at it. I'm sure you can appreciate accents - it's like learning any skill, you have to work at it and work at it and it takes an awful lot of time, until it's muscle memory and you don't have to think about it anymore.
On the whole, British actors star in theater, and I think there's something quite grounding about that.
For me, one of the biggest thrills is going to a theater and going, "Oh, I got a laugh!" Because you never quite get to hear it [otherwise].
Each year we go to the Cannes film festival and I tend to have all my friends pile in the back of my car and we'll drive from London. The poor production company think they're only putting me up and suddenly they've got eight people sleeping on my hotel room floor.
If you go into acting to make money then you're an idiot. It's my hobby and the fact that I'm doing my hobby for a job is mental.
I collect old first and second World War artifacts and things. I'm a little secret history nerd. I've been lucky enough to do quite a few war movies too so I've taken little things off each film.
What I've realized is that all of these people are so successful because they love what they do and they work exceptionally hard. No one gets successful in this business by fluke really. There are probably a couple of exceptions but most people just work so hard. They are working every day and they are doing their prep.
I think I got into acting because I kind of had not much else to do! I guess I was kind of looking for something challenging. I heard about the London Theater scene and it was very different from the upbringing that I had and it felt like a challenge. And the whole sort of London Theater schools, I was told that 6,000 apply and there are like 30 accepted to each one. I was like, "Yeah. Let's see if we can do that!"
I had a lot of time before I actually got my break so to speak. I was building websites for other actors. I worked in a grocery store back in the little village where I grew up but I found it mind-numbingly boring.
It was a movie [The Railway Man] that stayed with me a long time. It's still one of the things I'm most proud of. I got to know the man that I was playing and unfortunately he passed away just before the movie came out. It's one that meant a huge amount to me, and one that I'm particularly proud of.
I hate the word "method acting." It's just so silly. You hear people going, "Yeah I'm a method actor." I'm like, "So what happens if you're playing a period film or something? You're in the Second World War. And what happens when your mom calls you on your phone? Do you go, 'Oh! What is this strange talking brick device?'" No. It's stupid. But you do everything you can to get in that mindset.
I'd love to get fat on camera. Wouldn't that be great? I'll tell you what's almost as hard though, getting bulked up, getting that big. Here we are in LA and you see guys walking down the street and everyone looks like Arnold Schwarzenegger. That's really quite grim, if you haven't done it before.
I've been very reluctant on the Twitter front. But I do Instagram now, so I'm slowly coming around. I'm quite a private person, so much of what I do for my job means that I have to be quite public so I'm just nervous about everything being public. I might turn around. Three years ago, I was against all social media but I actually really enjoy Instagram now. Who knows? I never say never!
People expect your life to change completely. The main difference is I can get work now. I can do my hobby as a job. It's great. It's a privilege. But in terms of the rest of the stuff, I still got all the same group of friends I always had. I don't do anything different. We still go to the same dirty bars and do the same things. So nothing really changes.
I think in this world and this industry, if you let it, it does. And I feel that the people who don't have good friends and family around them are the ones who get a little funny. But I'm very lucky. I have good friends and good family and if I ever stepped out of line, my mom would take me down!
I'm an expert at killing time on planes now. I do a lot of reading. My secret sort of nerdy side is I'm quite into history so I read a lot of history books. Now I write for a few things and I've had a few history things published, which is cool. I indulge my nerdy side and it's kind of as far away as you can get from the acting world so that's nice as well.
It's weird when people are just staring at you because the thing is, people are not quite sure ... I get a lot of: "Are you off the TV?" It's funny. I don't and I don't get to the sort of clubs where people expect to see you.
