Ricky Gervais

[on Stephen Merchant] He’s eight foot tall, has stupid glasses, awful hair, but it makes me look good, which is why he’s in the series. We look so strange on screen together as well. The height difference is ridiculous. I want people to know that he is a freak and I’m the normal one. Don’t look at this and go, ‘What? Didn’t know Ricky was a dwarf.’ I’m not. He’s the weird one.

[On Lord Of The Rings] I don’t like all this stupid Gollum begat Wobblo and the Oompa Loompas and…Oh Jesus Christ! There was too much “Oh, God, here come the gloodloys…” Christ Almighty, what are they talking about!?

[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 grew up watching fantastic mainstream comedies like ‘Porridge’ and ‘Rising Damp’. There are some mainstream things I love.

[about the showbiz lifestyle] It’s all too much trouble for me. It’s probably because I’m fat and lazy and old.

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.

I personally really like getting a proper album with artwork and everything.

No wedding bells for me anymore. I’ve been happily married to my profession for years.

Anything where we’re the butt of the joke, no one tells us about it.

And you know, life is a constant learning experience. I learn so much with my kids. I read tons of books and study what they’re studying.

I love you, yes I do, I love you. If you break my heart I’ll die. So be sure it’s true when you say I love you It’s a sin to tell a lie.

If I have to listen to one more grey faced man with a $2 hair cut explain to me what rape is, I’m going to lose my mind.

I go by my instincts. It’s whatever I feel in the scene in the moment.

I’m a sucker for those sweeping love stories. When I read the script (The Notebook), I couldn’t stop crying! I just had such a powerful, instantaneous reaction – it was written so well.

My first real kiss came when I was 10, and it was in an acting class. I had to do a scene from a movie where someone gets kissed under a tree, and I did not want to do it! But my acting partner wanted me to feel comfortable, so he bought a picnic basket with all these snacks. He made such an effort- and it was cute.

See, the problem is that God gives men a brain and a penis, and only enough blood to run one at a time.

I never hated a man enough to give him his diamonds back.

Dope never helped anybody sing better or play music better or do anything better. All dope can do for you is kill you – and kill you the long, slow, hard way.

[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.

People think clowns – I wasn’t a clown. I would run parties. I basically ran around for two hours and ate massive piles of Haribo.

Chris Rock once said something that was really interesting. He said, “Women would run the world if they didn’t hate each other.” That’s the only thing preventing us from running this entire planet, that we hate each other!