Quotes by Emily Mortimer

So what I do now is to pre-empt that by making the up into a virtue, and telling funny stories about how crap I am before people have a chance to notice it for themselves and think maybe I haven't realised.

My dad had this philosophy that if you tell children they're beautiful and wonderful then they believe it, and they will be. So I never thought I was unattractive. But I was never one of the girls at school who had lots of boyfriends.

Lots of people there seemed to be in denial, in absolute denial, of death - everybody's pretending that death doesn't happen in L.A. if you do enough exercise and take enough wheatgrass and have your pill every day, you might not die.

Los Angeles is like a beauty parlor at the end of the universe.

It is brilliant going to the theatre and being forced to sit and listen and think about life. It can be almost a near-religious experience.

I'm still shy - I'm no good at my children's parent-teacher conferences, and I'm slowly learning how to ask for what I want. But I now know that I have a reserve of courage to draw upon when I really need it. There's nothing that I'm too scared to have a go at.

I'm physically completely mal-coordinated. My best friend used to make me run for the bus just to give herself a quick, cheap laugh because I definitely don't have that sophisticated cool thing down.

I'm just happy to be a film where for once I don't have to worry about my hair, because my managers are always complaining about my hair looking depressing in my movies. Which is true. I mean, it's true.

I was terribly shy when I was growing up, I really wasn't confident with other people and I think I was always afraid of up or not being this very cool, amazing person that I wanted to be.

I want any excuse to come home. My dad is not a spring chicken any more. If anyone says, 'Go buy a postage stamp in London,' I'll go and do it.

I decided to give acting a serious, committed try, and soon after, I read the script for 'Lovely and Amazing.' The story was beautiful and honest, and the characters struggled with the same insecurities many women - including me - face. I didn't think I had a chance in hell of being in the film, but I knew I had to go for it.

I borrowed my friend's car the other day in an attempt to persuade my husband that we needed a car and literally this is true, in the first day of borrowing the car, I got three tickets and I rear-ended it.

51st State was one that I loved doing because the character was so out there, and in a way I was sad to leave the character behind. I'm afraid I could never be that cool in real life!