Before I read the 'Bloody Sunday' script, I have to admit I hadn't thought about it that much. There was probably even part of me which assumed there was no smoke without fire. That the Catholics who were shot must have done something to provoke such a response from the army. I was extremely ignorant of the whole situation.

I've never felt that acting was my vocation - never had that tortured thing. I love acting, but it doesn't feed my soul.

I'm not very good at standard English.

Something about theatre perhaps scared me.

You don't learn charm. It's not something that you can acquire. I have used it much in my life with great success, but it's not necessarily what makes me an actor. It became a very easy label to attach to me. It also feels a bit dismissive. People go, 'You're so lovely and charming', but it's a wee bit, 'That's all you are.'

It's easier to act in your own accent.

It's hard to make a film in Britain. It's hard to raise money. The best stuff that is shot on film in Britain is usually shot on film for television.

My nightmare is that I don't want to be OK.

Producers get very jittery about things.

I spend an awful lot of time by myself and enjoy that.

When people say, 'You're perceived as a sex symbol,' I love the idea of that because it's so absurd.

When I went to university, I was already working professionally with the Ulster Actors.

I started a French degree at university, but packed it in when I realised I really wanted to be an actor.

My early ambitions were the same as they are now - to play for Manchester United. I was, and still am, football mad.

I think often there is great rivalry between neurosurgeons and cardiac surgeons. I think I maybe have a bit of bias with neurosurgeons' opinion that nothing tops neurosurgery! But that makes for a quite interesting conflict between the two.

Actually, I played Pontius Pilate as nice. An actor spends his life thinking he is Christ, and then he gets to play the character that killed him.

I do commercials, but I also go to Sudan as an ambassador for UNICEF.

I don't think I'll be doing a lot more commercials.

I lived a dual life, and when my dual life exploded, I began to feel much happier.

I think a lot of us who grew up in Northern Ireland weren't politicised enough, frankly.

I've never thought of myself as a classic leading man. I'm a character actor who happens to play leading roles. Come on, look at me. I'm really Desperate Dan.

If you are going to tell a story about a child going missing, it's going to have similarities with a real life child going missing.

Theatres, along with the likes of the Ulster Orchestra, for example, are the cultural heartbeats of our towns and cities, and without them, we are much poorer for it.

Because I grew up with women, I have a certain amount of charm, and I'm all right to get on with, kind enough, funny enough, blah blah blah.