My mum and dad had worked incredibly hard to afford me an education.
I'm a Prince of Wales Trust ambassador, so I'm all about giving youth an education, a voice and a chance to not take the wrong road.
It's very, very different and the scale is something else.
I love doing impersonations of people.
Having your adolescence at an all-male boarding school is just crap.
I've been quite a late developer on the clothes front, but I've suddenly realised it is one of life's joys.
Maybe it's because I was an only child, but I've always wanted kids.
I've realised now that the reality of children is you have to be in the right place with the right person.
I'm not loyal to one genre. I want to mix it up.
I've always wanted to play a spy, because it is the ultimate acting exercise. You are never what you seem.
I was brought up in a world of privilege.
Being a posh actor in England you cannot escape the class-typing from whatever side you look at it.
We all want to escape our circumstances, don't we? Especially if you are an actor.
The further you get away from yourself, the more challenging it is. Not to be in your comfort zone is great fun.
I had the privilege of being able to choose, or at least have the opportunity to work at, being anything but an actor.
Mystique is rare now, isn't it? There aren't that many enigmas in this modern world.
My own grandfathers were a submarine commander and a 'desert rats' tank operator in the Second World War.
Mum did a lot of commercial theatre and farces in the 1980s and '90s to make sure the school bills were paid.
Live a life less ordinary.
Lines are very difficult to learn.
Landing the role of Stephen Hawking was the most positively surprising thing that has happened to me.
It is a wonderful thing to get married young and become a father.
It does get strange when you realize people will hang around for hours to get a glimpse of you doing scenes outside.
If you have an over-preoccupation with perception and trying to please people's expectations, then you can go mad.
If I'd had fame early on, I'd have been able to abuse it in the way that a young man should.
