Our whole family assembles in Chicago at Christmas and usually in Aspen in the summer.

Brits and Americans have hundreds of different phrases for the same thing. Luckily it's usually a source of amusement rather than frustration. A flashlight by any other name is still a torch. My personal favourite is 'fairy lights ' which we boringly refer to as 'Christmas lights.'

My work always tried to unite the true with the beautiful but when I had to choose one or the other I usually chose the beautiful.

If something is irrational that means it won't work. It's usually unrealistic.

The reason a lot of people do not recognize opportunity is because it usually goes around wearing overalls looking like hard work.

Opportunities are usually disguised as hard work so most people don't recognize them.

Because I am a woman I must make unusual efforts to succeed. If I fail no one will say 'She doesn't have what it takes' They will say 'Women don't have what it takes.'

When I am cast in a movie where I feel that the woman's part is more interesting I usually start thinking about Spencer Tracy and Fred Astaire. They seem to be the most clear actors when working with women.

Mistakes are the usual bridge between inexperience and wisdom.

Vanity can easily overtake wisdom. It usually overtakes common sense.

I am usually part of any disaster at a wedding if I'm a bridesmaid which I've been lucky enough to be several times.

The Iraq war was fought by one-half of one percent of us. And unless we were part of that small group or had a relative who was we went about our lives as usual most of the time: no draft no new taxes no changes. Not so for the small group who fought the war and their families.

I have a friend that is a WWII buff and we sat and talked a lot about stuff like the war and the reasons behind it and you now it's all in the uniform. Once you're in it it usually does all the work for you.

Al Jazeera aired a new tape of Osama bin Laden. It was the usual stuff he called Bush evil the Great Satan called him a war monger. Basically the same thing you heard at last night's Democratic debate.

There's no doubt that usually a president's public image is enhanced by going to war. That never did appeal to me.

Confidence and superiority: It's the usual fundamentalist stuff: I've got the truth and you haven't.

Of course it's the same old story. Truth usually is the same old story.

Sex is full of lies. The body tries to tell the truth. But it's usually too battered with rules to be heard and bound with pretenses so it can hardly move. We cripple ourselves with lies.

I've worked with many directors good ones and bad ones. So if I have a chance to work the good ones I better put myself in their hands and trust them because that's my big opportunity to be different and to be better than usual.

Trust your hunches. They're usually based on facts filed away just below the conscious level.

Yes I travel in unusual circles. George Osborne and his wife Frances are my cousins.

I usually just have one cat. It is difficult but I have my one cat that he'll travel with me if it's appropriate if I'm not going overseas.

I myself believe that there will one day be time travel because when we find that something isn't forbidden by the over-arching laws of physics we usually eventually find a technological way of doing it.

I like ice hockey but it's a frustrating game to watch. It's hard to keep your eyes on both the puck and the players and too much time passes between scoring in hockey. There are usually more fights than there are points.