Well, the reason I’ve survived for this long is because any film composer that has an extended career learns to work within deadlines. The deadline becomes the motivating factor in the same way that a pro athlete can do these incredible things with two seconds left in the game. It forces them into their best mode. For film composers, the clock does get us into a higher gear.

to isolate and to force myself to write

And that’s a fine balance. It’s something I’ve really struggled with: slowing down and letting go of that urgent feeling of creative energy that’s bubbling up within me at all times; this urge I have to create, this endless urge. When I let go of that, it’s almost like a form of peace washes over me, where I’m so much more relaxed and at ease with whatever project it is I’m doing. If you become too all-consumed by a project, it becomes hard to actually see beyond that.

Well, I hate the word, but it’s true that something sometimes visits and other times doesn’t. I wish I felt otherwise, but I feel as though there has to be some catalyst, some inspiration. All of a sudden there’s a phrase in your head. Where does that thing come from? I don’t know, and because I don’t know, I don’t know how to have more of them.

My university tutor Raymond Williams.

I’m much much closer to my children than my father was to me, and I would hope that the quality of love I’ve given them is different from the quality my father gave me.

I get to airports ridiculously early. It’s an uncontrollable urge.

I threw my lot in with the theatre and in terms of the pleasure it's given me, I've never regretted it, not even for a second.

Has to be the poet Harry Guest.

Screenwriting is more lawyering than writing.