Essie Davis

“I'm incredibly ambitious, but I feel I've got a fantastic career, and I love the anonymity. I love that no one knows who I am.”

“There's something great about being on location with a bunch of people - there's a camaraderie and intimacy that builds up over time.”

“Acting is embarrassing.”

“I do like having a private life.”

“I miss my friends in London, and I really miss New York. But I also miss the stability of staying in one place and being able to just open a drawer if you've run out of sticky tape and chuck a new roll in the holder.”

“I think you've got to understand your character and where they're coming from.”

“I was terrified of being a mum because I didn't think I'd ever be grown up enough.”

“It's such a magnificent thing to be able to love someone and expect nothing from them.”

“Even if the Tonys aren't as glitzy as the Oscars, being a part of the ceremony is no less exciting.”

“'The Custodian' was my first film, and there were so many lessons to learn in that week. It was really fun, but for me, I look at it as a training film, and I'm not really proud of my work in it.”

“Goals are essentially private things.”

“I always knew I wanted to go to NIDA. I think I was very fortunate, and I do doubt myself often, but I didn't see any possibility of me not going to NIDA. I believed in myself, and I believed that, if you really do want something, you get it.”

“There are some jobs that you go for because achieving them would take your career in a direction that you would like it to go, but mostly, I want to play the roles and have had the great good fortune and opportunities to play some fantastic roles and been very, very fortunate.”

“I've sung before, first in a band in high school and then in a band in Norway, but never in a musical.”

“I think the unemployment rate for actors is pretty much the same in Sydney, London and New York. In all three cities, there are more actors than there are jobs. But I do think that there are far more acting opportunities in London and New York than in Sydney, where there are approximately seven actors that you see over and over again in every play.”

“I love Australia and loved growing up here, and that's something I don't want to deny our children, but it's difficult sustaining a career in Australia.”

“People who don't know how old I am can cast me as the woman in 'Girl with a Pearl Earring' and can cast me as Stella in 'Streetcar Named Desire,' and they are miles apart.”

“I don't know if I want to walk down the street and have everyone staring. I think that would be awful. I'm a pretty shy person, really.”