“There is no teaching to compare with example.” — Robert Powell

I have always been attracted to difficult work. There really doesn't seem much point in looking for the easy life as an actor. I would simply get bored.

There's not a human being alive I won't talk to. There's a quite simple rule. If you like somebody more than you dislike them you can have a relationship. Once you accept you like 75 per cent but 25 per cent you find irritating for this or that reason, you just have to ignore that 25 per cent.

I love being on stage. I'm completely, totally relaxed. It's the only time in my life when I know where I am and what's coming next. The other Robert Powell is probably fairly melancholic. Let's just say happiness isn't my default position. There are dark parts. I'm very good at it. I frighten people sometimes.

I was born five days before D-Day in 1944. My father was a mechanical engineer, which was a reserved occupation, so he didn't have to enlist. My mother was a housewife. She worked in a bank before marrying my father.