Richard McCabe

There's a mythical status to the Tony Awards. When you're growing up as an actor, you hear about Broadway and the Tonys, but it's not something you ever expect to experience.

It is strange how your understanding of a play changes. It normally happens after a performance and you suddenly think, 'So that's what that line really means' - it's like a light going on.

For me, this profession is about having a career where you can go on working for 60 years, so I'm not particularly bothered by things to do with fame; I like to think that I just do what I do.

I had a schoolmaster who was a supernumerary at Glyndebourne Opera, and through ,I got a job as a walk-on in Peter Hall's production of 'Don Giovanni' there in 1975 or 1976.

In my whole career, in fact, I can remember only two first nights when a show was at its peak on the first night. And I just wish we could devise a system where critics came not on a single evening but were given a choice of performances to attend.

In England, I'm known for playing villains.

Sometimes I look at Helen Mirren on stage and think, 'You really are the Queen.' You see people bowing to her at the stage door!

In 'Notting Hill,' I was part of a whole plot line over six scenes that was completely taken out. That was rather depressing.

I adored being at the RSC and working on the verse and getting the iambic pentameter right. You just skim across the surface, and the speech is over before you know it. You can just ride along on the music of it.

It's a great luxury to have the writer with you on a new play because you can write and re-write, just trying to get the arc of the story, of their relationship right.

Just observing - that's the best skill of all for an actor!

Experience tells us that whereas that degree of recognition can happen for one or two actors, for the vast majority it doesn't, so what matters is to try and be a better actor.