Quotes

It was perfect because as a kid I loved historical dramas like The Flashing Blade and Zorro, I grew up running around the garden with swords, pretending I was on a horse so when I read this script I thought, 'God, I can do this for real'. Sometimes, historical movies have been seen as a bit naff but this is very slick and there are so many elements to it.

[Of his professional relationship with Ioan Gruffudd]: The first time I worked with Ioan, playing a gay couple together, it was mad and a lot of fun. A scream. We were given free range, so we took a bit of a risk and had fun with the characters. Which is also dangerous. Because we've got so much history maybe we were in danger of going over the top, I don't know. Maybe some people think we have. It was just like being at home messing about in the flat. We do have a few characters that we like to mess about with. These two established themselves on the tube ride, when we used go to college and back everyday, and we went from there. It was a gift really. I'm not at all worried about playing a gay couple with Ioan. In all honesty there have been the rumours, which we have heard, that we are gay in real life. What do you do? You laugh. Good luck. No, they are a light-hearted couple in the film. Even if we played a couple who the film centred around and it was a serious piece and they were lovers, if the work's good and we want to do it, we'll do it.

[When he was playing the role of an angry man]: He's tired of the aristocratic oppressive rulers of England, he wants to get out and make a new world for himself. He's very interested in change and progress - he hates the suffocating feeling that heritage and ritual imposes on him. He's also very idealistic and very determined in what he wants. He's a believer and he'll follow through to the end. I can be like that.

Don't ask me why. I thought maybe I'd be a farmer. That was another silly notion. I think I'd last about five minutes, being a farmer.

[As to how he would best describe Sally Field, as a relative on Brothers & Sisters (2006)]: I call Sally Field America's Mother! She is incredible to watch. And she really is doing it. There was one scene where she was chopping in the kitchen and afterwards she came out with a bowl of guacamole!

[on his on- and off-screen chemistry with Sally Field, who plays Nora Walker]: One time she was in the kitchen and she likes to sort of prepare things in the scene, I wasn't really paying attention, and she's chopping away ... and she just presents this huge bowl of guacamole! That's a testament to Sally Field because I'm concentrating on just about getting by and remembering my lines - she's doing that and preparing guacamole for the rest of the cast!

[Of Sally Field]: With regards to Sally Field, she's everything you wanted to be. I've called her 'America's Mother.' She is, she assumes our nature grows within our group, and looks after us, and keeps up in line --- an amazing president with her work ethic. And she makes guacamole. We did this one scene [the kitchen scene], she always like to be busy with a scene and doing real things, and she gives us some things to do, I don't usually pay attention. And throughout causing the scenes, she'd be chopping and blah, blah, blah. Then at the end, she held up this bowl of guacamole and everyone made this. I don't think anyone was surprised, because for the moment, of course, you made guacamole during a scene. We could barely stand up straight and remember our lines.

I've suffered from an identity crisis my entire life. It's why I went into acting.

[interviewer saying he is great at masking his Welsh accent] Actually, not all the time - there was a moment when Ken was directing, I can't remember, the last episode. And he shouted, "Cut! Could you not sound like you're from Middle-earth?!" [everybody laughs]

[on the use of accents on Brothers & Sisters (2006)] Initially, my greatest aim was to sound as much, especially like the boys, like Balthasar and Dave, as possible. That was my initial benchmark, so we that would sound the same a lot of the time. [Interviewer: You can actually imitate Dave?] Yeah. [laughs] Sometimes, yeah. If I've had enough beer.