I never used gender as my crutch. Many women don't use gender as a crutch.

In politics, during my organisational roles, I have never seen gender bias within my organisation.

Let me very proudly say that as a television actor, I never, ever saw any gender bias.

Industry people do know when a PR movement plays out. The issue is that it is an insult to our intelligence when those who are doing the PR thing presume that we are not wiser.

TV and film were always governing passions of mine, and that first wave of great HBO shows in the early years of the millennium was feeding my desire for fiction more than the books I was reading.

Given the gruesome fate of the last Tsar, Nicholas II, and his family, and the fact that five of the previous 12 Romanov rulers were also murdered, it is easy to regard Russia's imperial dynasty as cursed.

My mother brought us to the library every week, and I read a lot. That's what kept me company. I went from school to school, but there was always reading.

Every individual we meet is different than we are. Members of the same family differ one from the other. Friend differs from friend, husband from wife, sister from brother, nation from nation. All these differences make 'feeling' love difficult and isolated to specific individuals according to our tastes and their personalities.