Rachael Stirling

My instinct is to surround myself with the company of wise, witty, wonderful women, and I have a great bank of female friends of all ages.

I want the kind of feminism that allows me to have a voice and to compete on equal terms with men yet still, potentially, to have one of them hurl me over their shoulder and carry me off somewhere, because I still find proper, old-fashioned masculinity deeply attractive.

I panicked in my 20s and 30s about whether I was doing the right thing. I was an excited puppy, wanting to please people and feeling guilty that I'd had a privileged education and an acting career.

Kristin Scott Thomas is terrific. She has a career in France and a career in England: how cool is that? I wouldn't mind that.

I know I'm not a hotly in-demand movie star, but I'm good at my job. And I want to keep working for the next 40 years.

I think if I'd been born ten years earlier when Ma was at the height of 'Avengers' fame, it would have been a different kettle of fish altogether, but she was very much a ma first and an actress second for my formative years.

I remember I went to audition for the first Daniel Craig Bond film, 'Casino Royale.' I was there in this Versace dress, and I remember looking in the mirror, and I couldn't have felt less like a Bond girl if I tried.

I'm not really Bond girl material, and that's fine by me. I'm a grafter; I'm not a star.

I used to worry about the lack of roles for women over 40. But suddenly, everyone has realised it's interesting to have a drama with a woman at the centre of it.

I find the idea that some kids go into acting because of their parents butt-clenchingly embarrassing. I've gone out of my way to prove myself as a separate being. I don't want to be seen as a subset of someone else.

If you get asked to play a part that makes you feel frightened, then you have to do it. 'Medea' is the opportunity of a lifetime.

Scotland was home to me from when I was 12 up until I was 22. I decided to drop my English bit, and when anyone asked where I came from, I always said Scotland. It really shaped the fibres of my being.