My dad's family were pretty working class, actually.

People look at me, they know I've appeared in costume dramas and they automatically assume I must be a Tory, I must be a certain type of person.

Soap opera seems to be a dirty word, but actually they are the most popular shows we have.

The female attention I have to struggle hardest with is from my two-year-old daughter.

What was interesting was talking to older gay men about what it was like being gay in the Eighties.

When it is good, theatre takes a lot of beating both to watch and perform.

As long as I am given the opportunity to keep performing and keep exploring in whatever medium, I'll be happy. As long as I get to spend time with my family, I'll be happy. As long as I can write in some form, I'll be happy. It is the essential things like that I equate with happiness.

At 13, in my first year of Tonbridge, I went up for the part of Macbeth. I was up against the 17- and 18-year-olds, but for some reason I got the part. It made me incredibly unpopular with my peers, but it was the English and drama teachers who stepped in to save me when others wanted me kicked out of the school.

At the age of 11 I was about 6 ft. tall and my voice had completely broken. That caused problems. I was this gangly, spotty, very unattractive kid. I wasn't cool and I wasn't a nerd. I didn't even want to fit in with anyone.

But even writing the column for the 'Telegraph,' that idea of working to deadlines, which as an actor that's not something you have to do in the same way. It's excited me into wanting to do a bit more.

Every night, half an hour before curtain up, the bells of St. Malachy's, the Actors' Chapel on New York's 49th Street, peal the tune of 'There's No Business Like Show Business.' If you walk the streets of the theatre district before a show and see the vast, enthusiastic lines it sounds like a calling: there is certainly no place like Broadway.

I have only recently got interested in film, and it is a strange way of working in many ways. But actually, when it is at its best, it's quite an extraordinary way of working between a director and an actor, to really explore an inner life.

I haven't done as many films as I would have liked. A lot of my contemporaries have done more. I don't have 'I will be a movie star' emblazoned on anything, but I'd like do a bit more screen stuff and then when the time is right come back to theatre. When it is good, theatre takes a lot of beating both to watch and perform.

I never quite toed the line. I was a bit disruptive. All my early school reports from the age of 5 were 'Daniel must learn not to distract others.' And now, that's what I do for a living.

I saw Mercury Prize-winners Alt-J for the first time recently, touring their debut album 'An Awesome Wave,' and I'm still riding the high: they're the most musically dynamic and exciting band to have poured tune into my lug holes live since Bellowhead.

I'm amazed by just constantly - there's not a week that goes past where there's not someone in Ulan Bator or Rio De Janeiro suddenly says, 'Ooh, 'Downton' started this week.' You completely forget it's staggered across the world.

I'm lucky to be married to someone who entirely gets what I do. She is totally sympathetic to the actor's life. Her own mother was an actress, so she sort of grew up with it.

I'm shocked at being recognized. You go to places you don't think you would be and still, you are. Taxi drivers often recognise me... but I haven't got a free ride yet.

In the 21st century, I think it's fair to say, homosexuality is more accepted in Britain and it's wonderful that my generation has been able to grow up with that.

It's head and heart. I like to feed both. I always wanted to be an actor. But the cultural-intellectual side of things has always excited me. I wouldn't want to let it go.