The actor talks about Motown and meditation, and divulges his secrets for really crispy, fluffy spuds
The best Sundays? Cooking roast dinners, having all my kids and their friends or nephews and nieces around. It’s a thing for me.
Chef’s tips? For beef, turn the oven up full whack for five minutes per pound. Then turn the heat off and leave it in the oven for two hours. My potatoes are legendary. The trick is to let them steam dry before you put them in the oven. If you can, boil them the night before so they become really crispy and fluffy.
Chef’s music? I’ll listen to some Motown, jazz, Frank Sinatra, Ella Fitzgerald, Aretha Franklin or Amy Winehouse and dance around the house. I do a lot of dad dancing, which embarrasses my kids.
To relax? I meditate every day because I suffer from anxiety, so I need to calm down. It’s a mixture of mindfulness and breathing: counting my breath in and out, counting before I breathe, then chanting, ‘Life is suffering, always impermanent. There is no self.’ I try to cultivate as much compassion as I can.
How exactly? I think about somebody neutral, like someone who has served me a coffee. I wish them happiness. Then I go on to someone I find difficult and I wish them happiness. Then I go through my friends and family and I wish them peace and happiness. Finally, I come to myself and I wish myself peace and happiness, too.
Sundays previously? When I was doing Ray Donovan, I used to come home for the weekend. I’d land at 4pm on a Saturday afternoon and leave at 7.30am Monday morning. I did that for years. Now I enjoy a quiet Sunday evening.
Sunday evening? I’m a member of the Academy, so we get all the Oscar films. My wife really watches things. She loves the structure of films and she analyses everything. It can drive me a bit mad.
