I love the Restoration. It’s a bit like coming out of the John Major era into the optimism of Tony Blair.

I got a lot of energy from directing the film ‘Ladies In Lavender.’ You wonder if you have the stamina because as an actor you can lounge around the trailer during the scenes you’re not...

People think I have the benefit of a public school education. I have this suave and debonair label, but really, I’m as common as muck.

The quality of writing attracts me to films, also who the other actors are, who the director is, where it’s being shot. Any or all of those things. But if the writing is really appalling,...

I think it’s counterproductive for actors to come to the set with well-thumbed copies of the book their film is adapted from.

I had a stammer through adolescence. Any fun I’d had performing in school plays disappeared and only came back at 18, when the stammer started to go. Then I thought: ‘Well, perhaps I can show...

A handful of older, romantic leading men, like Sean Connery, Jack Nicholson, and Robert Redford are still landing parts.

There is a huge fan base; they’re very knowledgeable and very loyal. I was astonished – before I started working on the series, I didn’t know anything about ‘Game of Thrones.’ I hadn’t heard of...

I’m riddled with cynicism. Whenever anyone says ‘trust me,’ the hairs go up on the back of my neck.

I like to be busy. I once shared an agent with the late Sir John Gielgud, who, at 96, was apparently still ringing up, saying, ‘Hello, Gielgud here, any work?’ Good on him. We’ve got...

I phoned this number and said, Please, sir, I want to be an actor.

We need to look to our laurels a bit with television in this country. I don’t think enough risks are being taken in drama television in the U.K., and I think a lot of programme...

I would have liked to have worked with Ralph Richardson and Paul Scofield, but they’re dead now.

Politics is the most corrupt profession on Earth, no matter where you are.

I was a window dresser for Burton’s once. What really put me off was the area manager coming round and saying, Charles, I think you’re a natch at this.

Most films are written and made with a hero around 35, or even 25.

When you have a label stuck on you, people tend to believe it. If someone calls you suave and debonair, you only get offered parts in a suit and a collar and tie. It just...

I’ve got a range as an actor! There was a time I played dramatic leading men.

A while ago, I did a television adaptation of ‘Bleak House,’ and the character I played, as far as I was concerned, had no redeeming features whatsoever. I wasn’t about to try to find any;...

I’ve done maybe twelve of Shakespeare’s plays. I was with the Royal Shakespeare Company for years. Whatever influence that has never leaves you. If you learn to drive a car, and you learn the right...

You have to attempt to be objective about yourself.

You should encourage a child to show off. You can say to a child, ‘Stop being rude,’ ‘Stop shouting,’ ‘Stop jumping around on the furniture.’ But ‘Stop showing off’? That’s awful.

Most feature films are 35-40 shooting days.

It’s a question of keeping one’s eyes and ears open and watching how other people play the game. They’re watching me too, to see what my attitude is like.

If I talk about Charles Dance I am talking about something else, something I operate and wind up and have to make an impression with and use to transmit someone else’s screenplay.

I’m playing one of the principal roles, which gives you more clout and more confidence.

Your senses are reeling all the time. Finally you find something to write and the very next day you go out and see something else which totally contradicts what you’ve written and every conclusion you’ve...

Power is always a corrupting influence.

If I was to put a little flag in everywhere I’ve been in the world, there’d be a lot of little flags.

If you get a bad script, then you start expending energy trying to make a silk purse of a sow’s ear. When the script’s as good as those on ‘Game of Thrones,’ say, I don’t...

When you get to a certain age, the work begins to thin out.

We have to take risks in British television. It has to stop playing to the lowest common denominator and patronising people.

We had five goats, two dogs, a cat and racks of commentaries on Shakespeare.

In my home, I listen to music; I play music: I play guitar and I play ukelele. And I swim and I ride a bike and I do all the things that everybody else does.

Actors can’t retire. If actors retired, there would be nobody left to play old, wrinkly people. You have to keep going, darling – don’t you?

A car to pick me up every day, a chair with my name on it, everybody being very polite… what can you do except sit back and watch it all, try to take it all...

You have to be selfish to be an actor.

My face lends itself to austere characters, and unless they’re two-dimensional, I will do them. Any actor will tell you that an interesting villain is much more interesting to play.

I like approbation. Any actor who tells you they don’t is lying.

Audiences seem to have a limitless appetite for vampires and for fantasy in general. Unlike many other British actors, I haven’t been building up my pension appearing in films like ‘The Lord of the Rings’...

I mostly play old period songs, as they suit a ukulele more. I bought it when I saw the tribute concert to George Harrison. Joe Brown came on and sang ‘I’ll See You In My...

My mother was a waitress in a Lyons Corner House, but she married up. She was keen on bettering herself. She taught me how to use the right knives and forks and behave properly.

I like to keep up with London theatre, but it is a question of time.

I don’t like watching television too much; it tires me out for some reason. But I saw a fair bit of ‘Game of Thrones’ because it was so good. I mostly watched episodes that I...

I’ve never been one for late nights, which is why I have always preferred making films to theatre. A play takes over your life: you start to feel sick at lunchtime, and by mid-afternoon, you’re...

Runners are the lowest of the low in film units. They’re paid very, very minimal wages – probably below the national average. And runners are now being asked to drive actors about, as well as...