Amanda Donohoe: Of course, like any woman, I look in the mirror and th...

I'm an atheist, so it was actually a joy. Spitting on Christ was a great deal of fun. I can't embrace a male god who has persecuted female sexuality throughout the ages. And that persecution still goes on today all over the world.

Amanda Donohoe

atheist joy fun

Its either feast or famine, and thats the way its been for as long as I can remember. Ive spent my whole career thinking Ill never work again. Every actor lives with that insecurity. You just have to negotiate the rapids as they come.

Amanda Donohoe

careers long thinking

I think the joy of any soap opera is it is always there. You are allowed into this world for a little while and it's safe in that you are watching other people go through some troubles rather than yourself. It's there every night, and there is something special about that sort of terrestrial television experience for a mass audience.

Amanda Donohoe

night people thinking

If you build a career on being a beautiful young woman, that's going to be a short career. I have to establish I can act. I don't want to have to visit the plastic surgeon every two years.

Amanda Donohoe

careers beautiful years

I read, go for walks and I love to garden. My hands are such a mess. People think I should have movie star hands, but they're just gardening ones. Always slightly grubby and with a bit of dirt under the fingernails.

Amanda Donohoe

garden stars thinking

My preferred environment is by the sea or somewhere rural. I don't want to be in a city, I don't want to visit New York and I don't want to go shopping.

Amanda Donohoe

cities new-york sea

My father worked for the Foreign Office, so he was away a lot of the time. We were a very volatile family. There was a lot of love and a lot of conflict. The conflict kicked in mostly during my adolescence.

Amanda Donohoe

conflict office father

What I do for a living is re-create human emotion, and that's a pretty weird thing to do from nine till five.

Amanda Donohoe

weird-things emotion nine

Ive always loved my red wine, and when Im not working I can open a bottle too many. I love to cook, so its one for me and one for the casserole. I would consume a bottle of wine on my own of an evening and then literally pass out.

Amanda Donohoe

red bottles wine

I had no idea 'L.A. Law' would be so mega. I knew it was a big show, but I was just one actress in a group of many good, award-winning actresses.

Amanda Donohoe

awards law winning

At 50 you're more confident, more comfortable in your skin and you don't put up with nonsense, especially from men.

Amanda Donohoe

nonsense skins men

I watch an awful lot of old Hollywood movies - Ill devour anything with Bette Davis or Joan Crawford. My absolute favourite is Sunset Boulevard starring Gloria Swanson.

Amanda Donohoe

sunset hollywood watches

I have no regrets about not having children. I still wait for the pang of guilt, but I have none. I tune into the television show Nanny 911 occasionally which reminds me how much patience and love it take to be a good parent.

Amanda Donohoe

regret waiting children

I don't think atheism means one does not believe in a spiritual life. I think it means one does not follow the tenets of the established religions.

Amanda Donohoe

spiritual mean believe

I don't like posh hotels. I like small, eclectic hotels, and luxury for me would mean really good company with good food in a really funky, beautiful house in the middle of a field where someone came and serviced the place for us.

Amanda Donohoe

luxury beautiful mean

I loved living in Hollywood - and the weather there was just fantastic - but there is something about rural England, and especially Suffolk and Norfolk, that pulls at my heartstrings.

Amanda Donohoe

heart-strings hollywood weather

Your roots, your family, your friends all become so much more important to you as you get older, especially if you are a wandering minstrel like me.

Amanda Donohoe

minstrels important roots

Soaps are one of the few areas on TV that really embrace older women. In drama, there's this ridiculous invisibility for women between the ages of 40 and 60. Unless you're old enough to play a grandmother, there just aren't the roles.

Amanda Donohoe

grandmother play drama

If all you're doing is making money, you have a luxurious but empty life.

Amanda Donohoe

luxurious empty-life making-money

People say to me 'You're a big Hollywood star', and I find it so funny. I still feel as though I'm the girl from Golders Green. I lead such a boring, normal life. I still go shopping in Sainsbury's. If the ability to do that was taken away from me, I'd go barmy. You lose your freedom. Be careful what you wish for.

Amanda Donohoe

me freedom life funny

Of course, like any woman, I look in the mirror and think, 'Oh, wouldn't I look better with a bit of Botox?' But you've got to find comfort in your own skin. I've watched women stretch themselves year after year until their faces are no longer recognisable.