- “Pain is such an important thing in life. I think that as an artist you have to experience suffering. It’s not enough to have lived it once; you have to relive it. Darkness is not a pejorative thing.”
- “There’s a lot of skeletons in my closet, but I know what they’re wearing. I’m not gonna act all ashamed of it” – on her early career.
- “It was total naivety that got me to Hollywood. I thought it was going to happen straight away. I told myself ‘give it 5 years, there’s no way I’ll be here after that if it doesn’t happen’. Cut to ten years later!”
- “On set is where I feel comfortable. The red carpet stuff, talking about the film, explaining your own life, it doesn’t come naturally. It’s all necessary stuff I suppose but it’s not my strength.”
- “I find myself gravitating towards drama. It interests me. In the books I read, the paintings I like, it’s always the darker stuff.”
- “For the record, I am actually British as well as Australian. People always think I’m Australian but I’m happy for the Brits to claim me back. I’m offering myself up.”
- “Instead of thinking ‘how can I slow the ageing process?’ I think ‘how can I bend the rules?’”
- “Whatever is said about roles drying up, I intend to keep working. Certainly now the roles couldn’t be more interesting – playing mothers, divorcees. I think it’s going to be exciting to play a mother of teenagers. The longer your life, the deeper it gets.”
- “My mom put me in drama classes when I was about 14. I’d been going on about it for some time, so maybe it was a way to shut me up.”
- “We’re so afraid of death in our culture, but I think if we understand it better, then we’ll appreciate the life we have more.” – in response to 21 Grams (2003).
- “I’ve had people who’ve seen 21 Grams (2003) say, ‘Wow, you’re so brave to be looking like that’. This shocks me. I think that’s what an actor’s job is, to lose yourself in a role”.
- “You have to make peace with yourself. The key is to find the harmony in what you have.” quoted in the Feb 01, 2005 issue of WOMAN’S WORLD.
- If I have to produce movies, direct movies, whatever to change the way Hollywood treats older women, I’ll do it. If I have to bend the rules, I will. If I have to break them, I will.
- “Even during my most intense scenes with Sean Penn (in 21 Grams), we found ways to have fun. Sure, I have my dark moments, but I’m the girl you’ll see driving down the highway singing to Blondie.”
- “It’s always nerve racking to take off your clothes on film. But doing it with a woman felt safer than with a man. You know you can say, ‘Don’t grab me there: That’s were my cellulite is’!” – after being asked if it was hard to do a love scene with a woman (Mulholland Drive).