I was born in a world of opera, theatre, films, poetry, art, and therefore, out of the wire, I made a stage. That's why they call me a high wire artist.
The Arts are the only acceptable theatre of war for peace.
Theatre is where my heart is. It's where I can do my best work. And even if I do films and TV, that's what I want to come back to.
Soon I worked during twelve years in theater works of the prestigious Theatre National Populaire. It was the best time of my life, the most difficult, the most interesting, the most exciting.
I went to Paris for a year in 1986 to study theatre; there was a lot of clowning around, buffoonery and fencing. It was then that my own style kind of blossomed.
I did ballet and gymnastics, and then I started acting when I was eight - just doing amateur theater at a place called Oldham Theatre Workshop in my hometown.
I remember going to the theatre when I was little and the lights going down and just getting really scared about what was going to happen up there.
You can't go around the theatres handing out cards saying, 'It isn't my fault'. You go onto the next one.
My plan is to have a theatre in some small town or something and I'll be manager. Ill be the crazy old movie guy.
I remember clearly watching a 'Sooty Show' at a theatre and telling my mum I wanted to be up with the puppets, not in the audience.
It was a different planet in 1967, the Broadway theatre. It had a little ashtray clamped to the back of every seat and the author got 10% of the gross.
The thing about theatre is that when it is actually occurring, when you have the audience on your side, you absolutely think you can will them to do anything. It's exhilarating.
I have a dialect myself; it's more pronounced, because I have studied theatre and been in England. It's half-British, half-Indian.
The British theatre and establishment is so hard to penetrate, and there are so many talented people involved in it. So, to be counted among some of those actresses... It doesn't get better than that.
If there's one thing that I've done on purpose it's to take whatever job, so long as it's interesting and challenging, whether it's theatre, radio, TV or film.
My interest in theatre and storytelling began in my mother's kitchen. It was a meeting place for my mother's large circle of friends.
A lot of my training is in classical theatre; I've done a lot of classical plays in New York and also at the Guthrie and here and there across the country.
My parents lived, breathed, ate and slept theatre. Emotions were right on the surface. Growing up, the unreal had as much importance as the real.
You wouldn't tolerate an underperforming surgeon in an operating theatre, or a underperforming midwife at your child's birth. Why is it that we tolerate underperforming teachers in the classroom?
It's like Branson. When I went to Branson there was only 4 acts in there. Now, you can't count 'em. There's so many theatres now, that only the strong will survive.
I came to write after several mini careers. I did live theatre, managed a cosmetics store and was a local television personality.
