RUFUS SEWELL

It's nice when women fancy me, but I think I will only disappoint them so I prefer it if they don't know who I am.

I've discovered that I've never had much respect for money, and that has meant that money has ended up ruling me a little bit more than it should have. So I'm trying to learn - at this late stage in life! - to actually control that.

I was very frustrated, in a physical sense, by people seeing me in a way that I wasn't. And I was beginning to find myself boxed into a corner. Hopefully things have loosed up a bit, and I've gotten better and become more relaxed as an actor.

Given the choice between someone saying I was handsome in a role or ugly but good, I know which I'd choose.

People talk about me in 'Arcadia' and I think I was okay in it but I've given better performances in other productions that didn't have the same impact. But I knew 'Arcadia' was going to be an event and I wanted to be part of it.

Of course, I want to look good, as that helped me get jobs. But it didn't get me the jobs I wanted and it held me back.

I don't think the roles that I'm necessarily known for in this country are my best work, or even anywhere near it. I didn't think I was great in 'Arcadia.' I think it's a great part and a great play and had a lot of attention.

I don't know if the money I've earned is going to need to last me for the next few weeks or the rest of my life.

My career has suddenly started to be the one that I'd always wanted, not in terms of level of success, but in terms of - and this is what I've been banging on about - playing different parts in different media.

I'm in a position where I'm being continually knocked back for the kind of independent films I want to be in because people don't know who I am.

I recognize myself to a lesser or greater extent in everything I read, good and bad, and that's part of being a human being if you're honest enough. And obviously the darker parts are the things you don't let control you.

At times, I think of my career as a map. The closer you get to the map, the more you know where you are, but the closer I get to my career, the less happy I feel. At the same time, I have carved out the career for myself which I wanted.

A large part of my adolescence was spent doing my very best to draw attention to myself.

I think the only thing I've got going for me as an actor specifically is the fact that I can change.

If my British film career was a girl, then I'd been hanging around outside her apartment a little bit too long.

For a long time, I've had to hustle. If a film role is obviously great, then it's been difficult for me to get a look-in.

Hollywood is my domestic idyll.

I've always liked the idea of regularly doing a play but I was offered things which I felt were too 'celebie' and West Endy.

Lazy journalists, they'll read stuff and get a quote then ask the same question again hoping I'll say a similar thing; it's very tiresome.

For a long time, I didn't give anything my all. I was so afraid that I'd be crap, so I held myself back.

I was the lead in 'Interview With The Vampire', until Tom Cruise decided he was interested. I was in 'The Wings Of The Dove' with Uma Thurman, until that got cancelled. I was in 'Shakespeare In Love' with Julia Roberts, until that fell apart.

People talk about opportunity knocking, but the gate was always swinging in the breeze before I got to the door.

I've gone through long periods without being with someone and got a bit lonely, but not for a while.

I'm very, very happy with my recognition/lack of recognition in England in terms of my life. In terms of household name-age. The public's memory is very short, luckily.

I think I was a bit frightened of having to be a grownup and tried to put that off for as long as I could.