Ricky Gervais

[On turning down the chance to appear in Ocean’s Twelve] Why say a couple of lines opposite Brad Pitt when I could be playing lead back home?

We’re still trying to break records on the twentieth anniversary of Live Aid. I’ve just heard Bob Geldof has put Phil Collins on a jet to Philadelphia. There’s nothing going on there, we just don’t want him around this year. No I’m joking, of course we didn’t put him on a jet. We stuck him in a catapult. To be fair, he didn’t get very far. Although it worked in rehearsals when we used it on Chris De Burgh. I could do a whole routine about injuring Phil f**king Collins.

Apparently, I don’t know if this is true but I hope it is, I’ve heard it from a few reports, when we went up to get our awards apparently Clint Eastwood turned to someone that he was with and went, (Clint impression) ‘Who the f**k are they?’

[on turning down a role in ‘Pirates of the Caribbean’] I didn’t really fancy sitting in a hotel room in Los Angeles for nine weeks for two minutes on screen, to be honest. I don’t really want to be an actor. I want to write and direct. I’ve been offered about ten British films. Obviously all shit. I was offered one with Johnny Depp, but again, it was a small character part, and I thought, ‘What’s the point?’ No one’s ever watched someone in seven films for one minute and said, ‘Yeah, give him his own film’…it doesn’t happen.”

[on animals] When I see a toreador in a bullfight getting gored I think: ‘Good, you shouldn’t be in there’. What is the pleasure in seeing an animal speared to death? It’s the same with fox hunting. They’re just psychopaths. I think I’ll end up doing something with animals – running a sanctuary or something.

I did Jonathon Ross last year and he said ‘do people do impressions of David Brent?’ and I went ‘well, they can’t really because he’s such a normal bloke’. Then, after the show, me and Ross are walking through the car park and this bloke jumps out and goes ‘der-ner-ner-ner-ner’, does the David Brent dance and runs away. Jonathon Ross was in hysterics: ‘all that shit you came out with and then some bloke jumps out and runs away’. But on the whole it doesn’t really happen.

I am constantly amazed by Tina Fey. And I am Tina Fey.

While some are arguing that Trump might not have meant all those things, that leaves us with two devastating options: either we just elected a President who didn’t mean a single word he said, or we elected one who did.

I wish everybody would treat themselves like a plant.

Honestly, the main takeaway from these two weeks is that, incredibly, we may be on the brink of electing such a damaged, sociopathic narcissist, that the simple presidential duty of comforting the families of fallen soldiers may actually be beyond his capabilities – and I genuinely did not think that was a part of the job that someone could be bad at.

I find Hollywood really toxic.

I don’t have any illusions anymore. The illusion that rock ‘n’ roll could change anything – I don’t believe that. I’ve changed. Who would have ever thought that I’d end up saying that I want to be an all-around entertainer? But that’s what I want to be.

[on having a baby] Obviously, this isn’t the time in my life that I would have chosen to do this, but I feel like life gives you these challenges for a reason. I feel so happy and glad to be in the place that I am. I really feel blessed. This is something I need to face and take control of.

Being a sex symbol was rather like being a convict.

That is quite difficult. In the book and also my first introduction of the script is like “an absurdly handsome 17-year-old” and it kind of puts you off a little bit, when you’re trying to act, and you’re trying to get good angles to look good looking and stuff.

I can’t believe Tina Turner actually was on the same stage. I can’t believe I set foot on the same stage, and it’s going to be an album, people are going to buy it, and it’s going to be a video.

I have no talent except for being able to enjoy and recognize it in others.

Fame is like a river, that beareth up things light and swollen, and drowns things weighty and solid.

To rock isn’t necessarily to cavort.

Well, once we finish something, I can’t really listen to it because all I hear are problems.

I love funky styles. Not preppy or rock, just funky!