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My dad was quite a forbidding figure. I realise now that that was mainly because he worked so hard. He wasn't unkind, but he was a presence.
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I am a gay man who loves James Bond films and snooker - all kinds of working-class pursuits.
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'Misfits' is one of my favorite shows; I think it's a fantastic show.
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Even when I was a child, I always wanted to be older. I realised just in time that it's a mistake and to enjoy my youth while I had it.
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I grew up with low self-esteem. I didn't think I was very pretty. I had glasses, red hair and was generally quite a spod.
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I always wanted to do Restoration comedy. It seems like so much fun.
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All films speak to their times. It becomes obvious only after.
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For some reason, I always get offered plays when I'm doing plays and then, if I stop doing them, people stop asking me.
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One of the pleasures of the original 'Grimm's Fairy Tales' is how incredibly ghastly they are. The ugly sisters have their eyes pecked out by crows.
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Grooming-wise, it is now a constant battle as I progressively turn into my father. I have to keep on top of ear and nose hair - things you never believe will happen to you. Suddenly I have a shaving brush in my ear and I don't know where it's come from, and the more hair I take the out, the more it surges back.
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Slightly forgettable movies can sometimes make great musicals.
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I'm terribly nostalgic, but I'm with the Elizabethans who thought nostalgia was a disease. It's a dangerous place to be because you can get caught up in it.
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They are called 'Emos' now, and before that they were 'Goths.' They didn't have a name for it when I was one, but I was that black-wearing teenager and yes, I wore a little eyeliner.
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Europe is so much the home of Horror, with its myths of vampires, werewolves, witchcraft and the undead, yet it's like those myths were exported to Hollywood, leaving Europe the room to develop a new tradition as a way of processing its traumas, particularly the two world wars.
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The reason I wanted to do 'The First Men in the Moon' was that there is something so challenging in the combination of space travel and the Edwardian period.
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The question I ask myself is: have I really just become a squeamish middle-aged man, or has something happened to the horror genre that shows a growing appetite for watching torture, or at least a desire to explore it on film? And if so, why would that be? I can't pretend I know. I just know I don't like it.
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When I was seven or eight, I was bought a fantastic book called 'The Movie Treasury of Horror Movies' by Alan G. Frank; it became my bible. It's packed full of the most amazing photos and is still fantastic to look at.
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I love going to galleries, particularly the National Portrait Gallery.
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'Monty Python' is now more recognised by the films than by the TV series.
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Sci-fi and fantasy used to be a TV staple throughout my childhood. Then it just stopped dead. It was seen as culty, a minority interest.
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The thing is, horror is a big part of 'Sherlock Holmes.' Doyle also wrote a lot of great horror stories, so there's a lot more horror in 'Holmes' that people possibly think of. There's a lot of curses and mysticism and real scares.
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'Son of Frankenstein' is never talked about in the same tone as James Whale's 1931 'Frankenstein.' But it should be. It was Boris Karloff's last appearance in the Frankenstein series and stars Donnie Dunagan, then a child actor.
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I'm a great believer in the beauty and the power of surprise.
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It's a cliche, but it's true that all the fun lies in baddies, grotesques and comic roles.