It is possible to work out of New York on film and television and still not lose your connection to theater.

I have been to the theater more since I have lived in New York than I ever really did in London working on a television show.

Light, trivial comedy does not appeal - it is not something I go to see.

I think insanity is the hardest thing to play.

I come from very conservative parents, and we weren't particularly wealthy, but we were comfortable.

I didn't become an actor because I thought I'd make lots of money.

I'm not interested in building wealth, which is kind of naive and probably frowned on, living in America. It's something that people don't necessarily understand, but if I die poor, I die poor.

The narrative that Peter Jackson has put into 'The Battle of the Five Armies,' it stands alone as a film. Rather than just finishing off the story, it's like a whole new adventure all of its own. I'm very excited about it.

People get to know me slowly and over the course of time. I'll probably still be a newcomer when I'm 60.

I don't think actors need to go on pedestals. I don't buy it.

I think that when Tolkien created Gollum and the ring, he even expressed in his biography that he never really knew what he created until he went back and looked at it.

I never like to go out of character when filming starts. I fear that if I do, I might not be able to pick it up again.

I'd like to act in a film without special effects.

I'd like to live off-grid.

I kind of got lost down a road of TV and film, so it's great to come back to theatre.

You can't reject anything in your life as an artist. Everything has its use.

I'm probably not very good at rom-com, being funny on demand; I'll leave that to the comedians.

I've done an awful lot of skiing all over Europe: I've done Italy, Austria, France. I skied loads in New Zealand - I did pretty much every ski slope I could find.

I don't really like making too much of a statement with what I'm wearing.

I am just not a water baby. I can swim, but I just don't.

I'm not much of a show-off.

I want to be strong enough to cope with the roles, but I don't want to be cast as the guy that takes his shirt off.

You can spend a bit of yourself when you give yourself to a character. At the end of a job, you have to remind yourself who and what you are.

I have a visual mind, so when I read a book, I get an instant picture in my head and it's very clear.

There's a very strong force in Tolkien's characters.

My instruction to my parents is that I would rather they enjoy their retirement than leave me anything when they go. I am much happier watching them enjoying life.

I do believe in pensions.

Heroism is a matter of choice.

Trump lies when confronted with the truth, since any crack in his narcissism might spread like an Ebola of the soul, and he would deflate like one of Macy's balloons on the Friday after Thanksgiving.

If every senator looks into the mirror and sees a future president, then every president looks into that same mirror and sees himself on Mount Rushmore.

Trump is a menace, both ignorant and chaotic. His saving grace is his incompetence.

The concept of cultural appropriation is nothing less than an intellectual fence: Keep out.

We are a segmented society, living in our individual bubbles.

Myths have a certain staying power because, really, they are aspirational - not always who we are, but always who we want to be. We see ourselves as good and generous. We believe we are a virtuous nation.

It's all right with me if Roman Polanski is freed by the Swiss authorities who have detained him at the request of the United States - if first I get a chance to bust him one in the mouth.

My heroes are not necessarily people of great ability but ones who did what I think I could not.

Opposition to social change is but one pillar of contemporary Republicanism.

Private enterprise cannot rebuild the nation's infrastructure or keep our research institutions vibrant. Government must do what only it can do.

A presidential candidate needs a slogan.

It takes a willful disregard of history to appreciate how white Southerners could look at the Confederate battle flag and see states' rights or a way of life or a tradition - and not one human being whipping another, which was a common occurrence.

Raising money, like sausage-making, ain't pretty to see, and it would be just criminally naive to rely on the big hearts of big donors.

Trump is a dust storm of lies and diversions with the bellows of a bully and the greasy ethics of a street-corner hustler.

We grow up to respect the gray. Black or white, one or the other, is childish. It represents the worldview of someone who does not know the world.

I reveled in political science and history of all kinds, and I felt for a long time that I had discovered all the secrets of life in psychology, although its Freudian variety left me cold. The id never made much sense to me.

Sometimes I think that Rush Limbaugh is the dumbest man in America. This happens whenever I take him at face value and forget that he is basically an entertainer with contempt for his audience. He will tell them anything.

Churchill had a marvelous way with words, and greatness accompanied him like a shadow, but in certain ways, he was a 19th-century man wandering, confounded, in the 20th.

Trump is unloved in his own house. A figure of ridicule, a theatrical creation, he is almost sympathetic. He was told by the greedy and the outright stupid that he would make a swell president. The Liar's Paradox has spun out of control, with liars lying to a liar who believed the lie. What would that be called? Fox News, I think.

Conservatives watch Fox News and read 'Breitbart.' Liberals watch MSNBC and read 'HuffPost.' When we agree, it's the truth; when we differ, it's fake news.

The grieving are surely owed our empathy, but capital punishment can neither right a wrong nor prevent another from happening.

Trump's overriding accomplishment is plain: The Republican Party can no longer be shamed.