Helen Mirren

I do think it's well over-time to have a female Doctor Who. I think a gay, black female Doctor Who would be the best of all.

Nothing is quite so emotional and passionate as what goes on inside of a family. People are driven to distraction by a father or a mother or a husband. Or a child.

I don't think there's anything on this planet that more trumpets life that the sunflower. For me that's because of the reason behind its name. Not because it looks like the sun but because it follows the sun. During the course of the day, the head tracks the journey of the sun across the sky. A satellite dish for sunshine. Wherever light is, no matter how weak, these flowers will find it. And that's such an admirable thing. And such a lesson in life.

The great marriages are partnerships. It can't be a great marriage without being a partnership.

There's a scary moment when you realise you're no longer the youngest person in the room. Especially if you've been a successful young person. That's followed, of course, by the realisation that you're actually the oldest person in the room.

It was not my destiny, I kept thinking it would be, waiting for it to happen, but it never did, and I didn't care what people thought ... It was only boring old men who would ask me. And whenever they went, 'What? No children? Well, you'd better get on with it, old girl,' I'd say 'No! F*** off!'

My parents believed in education and economic security, and I thank them for it. Because I think that's part of what's made my life stable. It was instilled in me. You have to be able to pay your bills. You do not get into debt. And I never have been.

It was never my intention to marry anybody. Economics are basically the only reason to get married, but I'm very glad I did it.

I learned quite early on in life that we are all two people. And one of those people none of us will ever know.

I'm under the impression that this notion of decency is disappearing from our society where conflicts are made worse on cinema and on television, where people are nasty and cruel on the Internet and where, in general, everybody seems to be very angry.

Where you grew up becomes a big part of who you are for the rest of your life. You can't run away from that. Well, sometimes the running away from it is what makes you who you are.

I was never that kind of star. I was never cast because I was gorgeous.

People with Parkinson's are not some weird people on the edge of human experience.

You can't control how other people see you or think of you. But you have to be comfortable with that.

Parkinson's is a slow but inevitable process. It's hard living with it on a daily basis. The difficulty facing people with it is that they never quite know 'Can I or can't I do this today?'

I have never in my life found myself in a situation where I've stopped work and said, 'Thank God it's Friday.' But weekends are special even if your schedule is all over the place. Something tells you the weekend has arrived and you can indulge yourself a bit.

When you're 16, you think 28 is so old! And then you get to 28 and it's fabulous. You think, then, what about 42? Ugh! And then 42 is great. As you reach each age, you gain the understanding you need to deal with it and enjoy it.

The important thing is to bring people with Parkinson's into our world and for the public to have a real understanding of it, as they've beginning to have with autism.

As you get older naked stuff [on film] gets easier. It's more to do with the role than what men in the audience think. There's a liberation about it.