I found the hedge-fund guys I met all to be very, very concentrated listeners - watchful and articulate and quick to defend, if needed. They all seemed to have this contained sitting posture. The legs, if they weren't crossed at right angles, tended to be close over the knee, their hands put together.

There are ways of avoiding becoming tabloid fodder and therefore giving people license to pry into your private life. And there's a distinction between being an actor and being a celebrity. You may become a celebrity through acting, but you don't need to do so.

It's sad that children don't spend enough time looking around and being amazed by what's in the real world.

There's this sort of cloud that hangs where people are like: 'How long can you keep the heat of 'Homeland' going?' People have short memories is the truth, and Hollywood loves the new and shiny.

I will always find a defense for characters, and that's why it's fun playing characters that are morally ambiguous, or are at least perceived superficially as being problematic.

The irony is that, coming from a white-collar British background, I tend to play blue-collar Americans!

Why do you think so many actors are only half-developed people? It's very easy when you're a young actor to have these intense, explosive friendships for short periods of time, because you can control what's shown of you. Then you go on to your next job and reinvent yourself again. I think it's important to find something constant.

I'm not averse to telling people off.

We had a good time mucking about during 'Band of Brothers' when we were young and single.

My parents came to see me in a play at Eton when I was 16. And then, when I said I wanted to try for drama school, they knew there was enough passion there for them to be brave and back me.

I'm not good enough to flip in and out of my Brit accent to my American accent.

It's constantly fascinating for me that something that feels absolutely right one year, 12 months later feels like the wrong thing to do.

This high-end, novelistic form of TV, you know, is just peppered with despicable people who do marvelous things and marvelous people who do despicable things.

I'm very sad 'Life' wasn't a big hit, But it was undone by politics at NBC. It was intense. I moved my wife, and we had two children back to back. So working those hours and living abroad in L.A. was a handful. But it was a great experience.

I've had loss in my life, and I like to think my mother's energy lives on in some faintly Buddhist way. I do find some comfort there.

I love going for a swim. Growing up in England, anywhere with a pool seems like the height of glamour to me.

If you believe - which I do - that acting is a bit like advocacy for your character, then of course I want to find the positive points.

I grew up in London, one of four children. We were a very loud family, not a lot of listening, plenty of talking. My mum was a hearth mother: she loved to gather us all around her - Sunday lunches were a big thing. She was very good at thinking on her feet - people used to say she should go into politics.

You can't do something that is morally vacuous or dysfunctional and then write it off saying, 'It wasn't my film, I was just doing a job in it.'

I think very few people still understand the distinction between CEOs on Wall Street and the hedge-fund billionaires operating separately.

I'm no more or less antisocial than the next person.

I am Damian Lewis, not Daniel Day-Lewis.

I'm one of those pesky Brits.

I'm not very good at strategizing.

I loved doing 'Homeland.' I loved playing Brody.

Would I have traded 'Homeland' for anything else? No. Would I trade 'Billions' for anything else? No.

No Western government has ever played the long-term in terms of foreign policy.

It's such an overused phrase: 'to be part of the conversation.' But it's true. It is nice to be part of the conversation - just be sure they are talking about you in the right way.

I had no ambition to go to America and be in a TV show. It's not like I've rejected something or decided that I've found something better. Your life just takes you off in strange and different directions.

Fallible characters are more interesting than superheroes in the end.

I came of age as a male lead actor just as the TV landscape dramatically shifted.

I didn't know 'Homeland' was going to be 'Homeland.' I just did it because it was a terrific script, and they pitched me the story line, and I was like, 'Huh, that's interesting.'

It's good to be busy on a film set because there is a lot of sitting around, so if you've got two roles to play at one time, then that's great to do.

There are jobs that come along in your life, if you're lucky enough, that elevate you in a considerable way. And 'Homeland' was definitely one of those jobs.

I have a three-year-old and a four-year-old at home, and my mornings are about just dealing with the fact of that. I oddly enjoy it.

You have to go where the good writing is.

I've been careful to work with good people on interesting material, mostly.

The best shows succeed because they tap into a national conversation.

I found that the quality of TV material that came to me was so great and was just often better than the film material I got. And when I find a good movie that I really like, I jump on it because it's exciting to do.

If you think you don't want to play another psychopath, but the script is amazing, and the director is fantastic, and the story is incredible, then you may end up playing your third psychopath in a row.

I investigated post-traumatic stress disorder. I've been to a unit where people are suffering from it, and I read a lot of literature. I looked at footage of soldiers in the combat zone. I found 'Restrepo' to be unbelievably useful.

I just don't consider myself to be, you know, an American actor. I don't want that life.

In England we burnt redheads at the stake, because we thought they were witches. There are still young redheads in Britain getting ripped for having red hair. 'Oy, Ginger!'

I'm not an American, but I have this weird connection to America in different ways through my dad living here for five years, my godfather being an American who I'm very close to.

I was, if you like, a successful schoolboy in that I had a degree of talent in all the required things that make you a success at school.

I'm one of those idiots; when I'm working in America, I wake up with an American accent and stay with it all day till make-up comes off.

You can't be sent away to prison for life and feel OK about it.

There's something important, as an actor, about allowing yourself to be approached by people to do roles. People see different things in you.

You know, this idea of going around the world imposing democracy by growing a middle-class, a trading merchant class that is independent of your faith, is a good notion, but we're all partially different - it's no good imposing systems on people that it doesn't suit.