But when you're a celebrity, you discover that you're no longer the pursuer, but the one being pursued. That's one of the disappointments I have had since becoming a single man.

For any new technology there is always controversy and there always some fear associated with it. I think that's just the price of being first sometimes.

Well, you know I have an office, my film offices. So I know that syndrome. I fancy offices, so there must be something wrong with me. Even the window cleaner intrigues me. It's a very sexy environment.

When I think about actors I know, I'd much rather hear about who they're shagging than what film they're doing next.

Basically, my life is so boring, it's embarrassing.

With 2 movies opening this summer, I have no relaxing time at all. Whatever I have is spent in a drunken stupor.

But when you're a celebrity, you discover that you're no longer the pursuer, but the one being pursued. That's one of the disappointments I have had since becoming a single man.

The reason I turn down 99% of a hundred, I mean a thousand, scripts is because romantic comedies are often very romantic but seldom very funny.

Plus, teaching brings home to you very fast that you actually know nothing. I didn't realize that before.

I cling to the fantasy that I could have done something more creative. Like actually writing a script, or writing a book. But the awful truth is that I... probably can't!

The only reason my work seems to be eclectic up to a certain period is because I was a failure as an actor.

I don't think there's much point in putting me a deep, dark, heavy, emotional film because there are people who do it so much better than I do.

And I particularly like the whole thing of being boss. Boss and employee... It's the slave quality that I find very alluring.

I don't have any particular burning desire to go back to being cuddly. Not really.

I'm a laugh tart. I make no secret of that fact.

Women are frightening. If you get to 41 as a man, you're quite battle-scarred.

I had Courtney Love's left bosom out of her dress on my plate in front of me. It was extraordinary. I didn't know where to look.

And film acting is incredibly tedious, just by its nature. It's incredibly, mind numbingly slow.

The moral of filmmaking in Britain is that you will be screwed by the weather.

I think that's the whole point of Bridget Jones. It's all about that it's okay to fail.

Most actors really love it, that's what they want to do. They burn to do it. And so they'll read a script and think, that's an interesting part. And because they love acting, that blinds them to the fact that the rest of it is pretentious nonsense, which it very often is.

I find it hard to understand why Scorsese has never called. You know, given the natural menace I bring to the screen.

Neither Elizabeth or I are keen to do a real-life couple on the screen. It's not very electric.

You know everyone loves to be the villain.

The truth is, I'd never seen a Cary Grant film. Since then I have watched his stuff and it's astounding, but I don't see any similarity between us. Except for the fact that I'm told he used to wear ladies' underwear, which is something I also do.

I think maybe in a way it gets worse because you come in with a real reputation and they've paid you lots of money and all that.

But I just know from experience that accent wise, even if you're an accent genius, crossing the Atlantic is the hardest thing in the world either way.

Strangely enough I'm better on a stage. I love that I feel like I blossom in front of a whole bunch of people.

I don't particularly like babies. I don't mind them for about four minutes. That's my max. After that I can't quite see what everyone's fussing about.

'Notting Hill?' Does that poke fun at being British? Maybe it does. In 'Mickey Blue Eyes,' that's kind of the point: the clash of worlds, the unlikely combo of a respectable Englishman and a mob guy. If you take out the Britishness, you don't really have much.

'The Lair of the White Worm' is quite a strange film. It's difficult to be good when you're saying lines that have been translated from Spanish to English by someone who speaks French.

A free press is the cornerstone of democracy; there is no question about that.

A lot of actors look at scripts and think, 'How will this stretch me as an actor?' But I always thought, 'Do I want to turn the page? Is this going to make people laugh?'

After I found that I had become an actor, slightly to my surprise, I did have some insecurity, and I did take some rather strange acting classes at a place called The Actor's Studio in London. I don't think they did me any good at all.

All I know is for a number of years, if someone like me called police for a burglary, a mugging, or something happened to me, chances are that a photographer or reporter would turn up before a policeman.

Although I'm largely doing other things in life, it's very nice occasionally to put my toe back in the waters of show business.

As it is, I have a limited range as an actor - light comedy. I have never been a fan of romantic comedies, and yet that is what I have ended up mostly doing.

At home, I hardly ever leave London. I don't like the countryside in England.

Broadly speaking, there are two kinds of acting: character acting and lead acting. And in my life, to begin with, in the 1980s, it was all character acting. And then when, by fluke, through 'Four Weddings', I got into doing lead parts, it's a completely different thing.

Comedy is probably a way of dealing with anxiety. Sometimes it's a way of dealing with pain.

Courage is soldiers fighting on the front line, or people living on the bread line.

Do I think human beings are meant to be in 40-year-long monogamous, faithful, relationships? No, No, No. Whoever said they were? Only the Bible or something. No one ever said that was a good idea.

For a few years, I thought I was putting show business behind me. I was busy doing other things in life, particularly with politics. I was not out looking for films, really. I lost interest.

Frankly, I think I'm marvelous in rehearsal! Then you turn the camera on, and it gets stiff and tight. And then you trudge back to your trailer feeling sad. That's been my experience of film acting.

I always admire the French and the Italians who are very devoted to their marriages. They take them extremely seriously, but it is understood that there might be other visitors at 5 o'clock in the afternoon. You just never boast about. They never say anything, but that's what keeps marriages together.

I certainly hated actors and, more importantly, they hated me.

I couldn't put my hand on my heart and say I think that being in a relationship is a natural state for a human being.

I don't do much acting anymore anyway, and not to work for 20th Century Fox is really the least of my worries.

I don't want to see the end of popular print journalism.