Quotes

[on her role as Special Agent Dana Scully on The X-Files (1993)] I am more spontaneous than my character . . .

[interview in "Movieline" magazine, Dec. 1998] Fame is complicated and definitely overrated. There are perks to it that are unfathomable. But the other aspect is there's little to no privacy at all - being anywhere at any time and knowing that somebody you cannot see is probably taking a picture of you, which has happened hundreds of times. I look around and cannot see anyone and a couple of weeks later I see a photo of me looking around.

When I think of normal, I think of mediocrity . . . and mediocrity scares the fuck out of me!

It's easier to be myself here. I can go out wearing whatever the hell I want, no matter how ridiculous it looks. If I do that in America, people look at me like I'm insane. There are aspects of the British press which are incredibly intrusive, but then you will go to a premiere and someone will ask permission to take a photo, and when you say, "That's enough", they will back off. In the States, you go to a restaurant and there are people lined up outside with 8x10s of you. Or they just follow you with a video camera. I had someone deliberately rear-end my car a few years ago in L.A., and there was a video camera: they were videoing my reaction. Luckily, I was in a good mood.

I know people who are embarrassed to be American. They don't like showing their passports. It's becoming a scary place. It takes someone very brave not to be quiet, someone who doesn't mind death threats, their life being turned upside down, news cameras outside their door. There is no freedom of speech in America anymore. They are not living up to the constitution. There's so much fear in America and control.

My tendency is towards the opposite of health and taking care of myself. My natural tendency is destructive. In order not to act on that, I have to be careful. The minute I don't feel like that, if I let down my guard, I'm in trouble.

I often showed up ungroomed. It didn't occur to me. Then I'd end up at a premiere and I'd think, what are you doing? I remember being at a restaurant with a famous British actress. I knew there were paparazzi outside. My intention was to make a beeline for the car. But then, as we were walking outside, she applied lipstick. I thought, what is she doing? But her public image is very glamorous. It's a different mindset.

I don't show my face [in L.A.] very much, and so that makes it a bit more complicated for me in terms of work. They [producers] need to see you in the press, and in their face, in meetings, auditions, whatever. And as far as they're concerned, I haven't provided enough of an example of the kind of things that I can do, as an actor, for them to justify hiring me without me sitting down in front of them or having me dance around.

I don't usually like seeing things I'm in. I get really depressed afterward.

I walked in thinking, it's going to be like riding a bicycle. It wasn't. It was like riding a unicycle. I'd been trying so hard to stretch myself in other roles, and to catch myself when I did anything that remotely resembles Scully, that when I was put back in the ring with her, my brain started misfiring. [The New York Times, July 13, 2008, on how unexpectedly hard it was for her to get back in character as Scully for the movie The X Files: I Want to Believe (2008) five years after the end of the television series.]

There are a lot of things I would have done differently, but Scully wouldn't have been one of them.

[on The Fall (2013)] Tennison [Prime Suspect (1991)] certainly inspired my performance, in that she certainly had an ego and quite evident character flaws. It had been a long time since I'd read a script as good as this, and I was really impressed by how Allan [Allan Cubitt] gets into the psychology of his characters.

I never know from one day to the next whether I'm feeling outspoken or not, which wouldn't make me the most reliable spokeswoman for anything.

I don't understand technology. I don't even Tweet. I have someone in the US who does that for me; nothing personal, just work stuff.

To me a relationship is about loving another human being; their gender is irrelevant. I'm leaning towards the idea that it's time for somebody to be brave enough to ask me out. I've asked out guys in the past. I remember being in the cinema in the States and I made eye contact with a man going in. I noticed we laughed at same points and seemed to respond in the same way to the same moments. We were both with friends. I stopped and thought "Fuck this! What am I doing?" So I rushed back down the street, went up to him and said "Would you like a coffee sometime?" We dated for six months.

I'm very headstrong in terms of how I want things to go, so I've made an effort to become more patient and compassionate. I don't have a tendency to share. Even my own assistant doesn't know what is scheduled for my week or my day.

I generally have a tendency to steer away from outright political discussion in interviews, because I am an actor, and there's so much that I don't understand, and I don't for a second feel like I have a right to that platform. I don't want to get into a discussion about Trump or about Brexit or any of that - I feel it's best left to people who really understand the very, very complex issues. Not for a second am I going to pitch in, because I don't really know what it is that I'm talking about. I have opinions, but I don't think my opinions are more valid because I'm an actor and have more of a platform than others.