When you are traveling in vaudeville, you experience so many different kinds of audiences, depending on what time of the week it is, how long the pubs have been open, and things like that.

I think it's the essence of any film and any stage production - any work where you do work with other people - of course collaboration is hugely important. One does, for awhile, become family.

'Simeon's Gift' is really - it's about a musician who - in the Middle Ages, who goes out to find his muse.

The loveliest roles, for me, have a growth arc - a beginning, a middle, and an end - and I'm always grateful when I can find one of those emotional journeys.

I had no education whatsoever, and my mother said, 'Oh, you'll get a much better education in life.' I did to some extent, though I always wish I could have tried it.

I didn't know other children from divorced families, and I was a bit of a lost soul for a while. Then suddenly, I was performing. And it gave me an identity.

I'm beginning to think that I like the behind-the-scenes work as much as I do in front of the camera as I get a little bit older.

I'm not very good with rap and things like that.

I had a lot of learning on my feet.

Because of the Thames I have always loved inland waterways - water in general, water sounds - there's music in water. Brooks babbling, fountains splashing. Weirs, waterfalls; tumbling, gushing.

I was named after my two grandmothers - Julia Elizabeth.

For me, whenever I choose a song to sing, it's about the lyric first.

I love to prune my roses. That's the one thing I really feel I do pretty well. Other things I usually, because I travel so much, leave to my gardeners who know what I love. But I do love to prune them, because you forget everything else. It's like if you're a painter, you can forget everything else while you're doing it.

When I've least expected it, an enormous opportunity or stroke of luck has crossed right under my nose. So I tell everybody, if you're passionate about what you do and you love it, do it. But do your homework. Because you'll never know when the opportunity is going to happen.

I've got a good right hook.

I adored my birth father and constantly worried that I was being disloyal to him and his schoolteacher roots if I spent too much time performing and enjoying it.

If you've been fortunate enough to do a film that appeals to the entire family, that's the audience that's probably going to come back to you in something else.

I was a child prodigy who had a freak voice of something like four octaves.

I'd say just go with the flow. And I take my hat off to any mother out there who works full-time and raises a family as well. It's hard work.

I justified working so hard by knowing that I was helping to maintain the roof over our heads.

I come from a long line of below-stairs maids and gardeners. Good ol' peasant stock. My mother and her sister made a quantum leap out of that life. Then I made another quantum leap.

I am thrilled to be dame. It's one of those - the fact that you have been honored by your country is what it's all about, and it just feels good right there.

All careers go up and down like friendships, like marriages, like anything else, and you can't bat a thousand all the time.

I turned down 'The Prime of Miss Jean Brody' with Maggie Smith. I think she got the Academy Award.