Rupert Everett

I'm a gay man who came from the last years of illegality. That focused my whole character. I think it focused everyone's character in a way. You saw yourself as outside of the main structure.

I don't think many actors are that good, to be honest. I certainly don't think I am.

You cannot be politically correct in a war.

To be a soldier one needs that special gene, that extra something, that enables a person to jump into one on one combat, something, after all, that is unimaginable to most of us, as we are simply not brave enough.

Being in Hollywood is like being in the Christian right these days.

I think marriage is ghastly.

We now live in a world where the only thing to have is success, but failure is marvelous. It's fertiliser, it's like living fertiliser, because you're forced on yourself.

Authority figures are so irritating. Because they always tell you to do things for reasons that aren't very good. That sums up what authority is about for me.

I've never been any good with authority.

There's still a tremendous amount of homophobia in our culture. It's regrettable, it's stupid, it's heartless, and it's immoral, but there it is.

The fact is that you could not be, and still cannot be, a 25-year-old homosexual trying to make it in the British film business or the American film business or even the Italian film business. It just doesn't work and you're going to hit a brick wall at some point.

You're not allowed to be an eccentric in the world, you have to fit it.