Who am I to pass judgment? Judgment has been passed on me, but I adhere to, 'Let him who is without sin cast the first stone.'
— James Nesbitt
My mother certainly doesn't think I'm charming!
I get an awful lot of people coming up and saying they went to school with me. There must have been 80,000 pupils at that school!
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.
If I get to the end of my life, and people say, 'He was in 'Cold Feet,' well, I was, and it was great. I thought the fourth series wasn't great. I thought there were weak episodes throughout. Overall, I thought it was a good show, it had an impact, it dealt with a lot of issues, and it was a great part.
It's easier to act in your own accent.
My best friends are still the ones I first attached myself to when I went to school because, all of a sudden, I was leaving the rather pampered and occasionally very annoying world of having three older sisters to go to a male-dominated world.
When people say, 'You're perceived as a sex symbol,' I love the idea of that because it's so absurd.
I started a French degree at university, but packed it in when I realised I really wanted to be an actor.
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.
Brain surgery is a fairly aggressive process. There's a lot to get through. There's the beautiful, delicate shaving first, which is really lovely. There's a wonderful ceremony of putting all the covers on, so only the little bit you're operating on is revealed. But once they make the incision and tear the skin back, the drill comes out.
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.
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.
I grew up loving women and without misogyny, rancour or prejudice, totally loved and loving. And no matter what has happened since, I don't think I have treated women in my life very badly.
My wife is a very strong woman.
There will only ever be 13 dwarves in 'The Hobbit' - and I was one of them. If I had my time again, would I do it? Yeah, I would.
I am in the public eye, and I accept that my actions may be open to question.
When I did the film 'Hear My Voice' a few years ago, I disappeared fully up my own backside for a while. Because I thought my career was taking off, I became a bit of an egomaniac and a pain in the neck. I thought I was God's gift to mankind and the greatest Irishman since George Best.
The whole process of making 'Bloody Sunday' was difficult but extraordinary.
I've never felt that acting was my vocation - never had that tortured thing. I love acting, but it doesn't feed my soul.
Something about theatre perhaps scared me.
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.
Producers get very jittery about things.
There's some irony in playing a journalist after some of the stuff that has been written about me, but it's a great profession, particularly investigative journalism.
My early ambitions were the same as they are now - to play for Manchester United. I was, and still am, football mad.
Richard Armitage is very good at the old horse riding because of course he did it in 'Robin Hood,' so he's very good at that.
I do commercials, but I also go to Sudan as an ambassador for UNICEF.
I lived a dual life, and when my dual life exploded, I began to feel much happier.
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.
It's a complicated relationship with the place one grows up in, particularly if it's Northern Ireland.
I'm increasingly realising our consciousness and subconsciousness are extremely different, and our subconsciousness motivates us, but so far, I don't know what drove or motivates me.
As I told Piers Morgan, 'Catholics have confession, whereas Northern Irish Protestants only have interviews.'
I didn't much like Las Vegas. The noise of the place and the whole 24-hour, 'let's play the slot machines all night' culture of the place just left me cold.
In my life, I have made the occasional catastrophic choice, and it's just a case of moving on and learning from it.
It's easy to get carried away with yourself.
When you're brought up in a Unionist culture, you can't help but feel Unionist.
I'm not very good at standard English.
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.'
My nightmare is that I don't want to be OK.
I spend an awful lot of time by myself and enjoy that.
When I went to university, I was already working professionally with the Ulster Actors.
People love watching medical dramas - they also love watching documentaries about the workings of the brain.
Perhaps not being very self-aware in the past masked depression. I think I was confused. I think I was immature. I think I probably was quite depressed.
I don't think I'll be doing a lot more commercials.
I think a lot of us who grew up in Northern Ireland weren't politicised enough, frankly.
Drama asks some uncomfortable questions at times... It goes to pretty dark places.
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.
I don't know a single person who doesn't regret the things that they did to hurt their parents, or the things they didn't say to them.
When you suddenly become successful, the change is enormous, both financially and in terms of recognition and the way people treat you. I found that hard to deal with. I got very guilty about it, and I think I put up obstacles to prevent myself enjoying it.
