Quotes from Sarah Lancashire

During a performance of 'Blood Brothers' in 1990, I forgot to sing. I was so moved by what my co-star Kiki Dee was doing, that I completely missed my cue.

I think Jack Thorne is an exceptional writer.

I own a copy of the original 'Talking Heads' by Alan Bennett, which I purchased many years ago shortly after they were first broadcast. It's been lovingly well-thumbed over the years. They are magnificent. A masterpiece.

I have managed to get through that tricky turn into your 50s with two great roles. It is great to see characters for women of a certain age.

An 'Ordinary Woman' is the beautiful and achingly poignant portrait of Gwen, a complex and troubled woman in her middle years.

Sometimes it's necessary for soaps to hang on to an audience by sensationalizing, but it's a beast I don't understand any more, an art form that has fostered extraordinary talent. It's a great arena to learn your craft before you move on.

I won't say I'll never go back to a soap because an actor's life is so precarious. You can have the most wonderful patch where everyone wants to work with you, and in the blink of an eye the phone won't ring for a month, even a year.

My twenties were a write-off.

Celebrity and actor are two completely different professions, and I don't believe that they mix if you want to maintain any sort of credibility.

I'd like to think little miracles do happen in 'Angel Cake.'

I don't search it out - I really want to be clear, I don't search out the misery! I'm not sitting at home going, 'I can't wait to do another harrowing piece of work.'

My father was a TV scriptwriter. He would perform his dialogue out loud, while my mum transcribed it at the typewriter. So I grew up thinking that plucking characters out of the air was an extremely normal way to behave.

I have to work at my own speed.

Marriage is not for everyone, but spiritually it is very necessary for me because I have a desire, a need to feel owned.

Accents are interesting, because they very often inform the way a person moves.

The Barbara Hepworth museum in St. Ives is fascinating. Her achievements were astonishing.

Now that I'm in my late 40s, I'm trying to make up for a little bit of lost musicals time.

The writing is only ever the attractive thing about a part. And also if all the elements within the writing come together - the character and the structure and the narrative - if they are all there then you become excited.

It's too easy to underestimate your audience. But it's not rocket science: bad plays don't get people on seats; good plays do.

To be asked to perform a new 'Talking Head' was beyond any expectation. The matchless brilliance of Alan Bennett's words coupled with the extraordinary wisdom of Nick Hytner's direction made this a thrilling and quite simply unforgettable experience, and I'm enormously grateful.

I'm not very good at watching myself. I look at it and I think, 'Oh, they've used the wrong take.' My job is over and it's not healthy to sit there and scrutinize your work as you're invariably unhappy!

I do find it quite difficult to complete a job and return to normality - it does take a bit of time to find my healthy place.

But I am Northern myself, and there is a certain rhythm of Northern speech that is very comical: that combination of the choice of language and the speech rhythm, which in itself is very funny.

Relationships are very complex. It's very unusual to see something which is so 'complex portrayed on screen.