Quotes

Children understand feelings of loneliness, of being sad, of feeling pressure from their peers. They respond to your performance immediately. Adults sit on their responses.

[on returning to the stage in '4000 Miles', 2014] My husband died, utterly unexpectedly three years ago, in my bed, in my arms, in the early hours. I stopped everything. And now I'm back. I don't know how long I'll be back, but I'm back for this play because, goddammit, it's worth it. It's about being older, it's about getting old and it's definitely about the challenges that come along in every age range.

[on how she approaches a role she has chosen to play] I could care a little bit less and probably give something that is perfectly fine. That's not me. I feel such a huge responsibility to make these people real. You borrow from the deepest parts of your own knowledge and experiences. Be they pleasant or painful, unforgettable or completely banal, you're taking that up out of your memory tissue and pulling it to the foreground on behalf of the character, because she needs it, because she knows what abandonment is, what it means to feel out of control. She must know. She knows what it means to be frightened. She know what pain is. And she knows what love is, too.