"I DIDN'T like school that much but I got into drama and that was really the key for me, I found my impetus then," says Daniel Craig about growing up in Liverpool.
"It was the Everyman who got me into acting. Liverpool Art College and Manchester Polytechnic were producing all these great things and my mum (arts teacher Olivia Blond) helped with the stage design and it was part of her social life, it was were she hung out.
"I'd be taken backstage and there'd be all the actors there and I just got the buzz, the excitement. You'd go and watch the play and then backstage afterwards the actors would look like these huge people - because they were to me - and they were more larger than life because sometimes they'd be ptoo.
He continues: "The Everyman was flying at the time with the talent that was coming out of there. And everyone made everything absolutely available. They used to have these cheap seats so it was absolutely acceptable to everybody. My mum was entralled by it and it put something into me too."
In his late teens he joined the National Youth Theatre and duly moved to London and has remained there ever since although he keeps a keen eye on what's happening in his home town.
He's a Reds fan ("there's only one team in Liverpool" he jokes) and was delighted with latest copy of the Post and Echo's copy of The Kop which was given to him.
He's also delighted at the city's nomination as Capital of Culture.
"I'm over the moon. I mean I left Liverpool in '85 and it was right at the bottom. It was in a really depressed state. Progressively year after year the city centre has been brought back. I don't know how much of that is down to McCartney school but its gorgeous up there now."
He admits finally: "I mean I'm from London now - I can't really can't call myself a Scouser any more because my whole adult life has been spent in London.
"But I'm still so really proud that its got back on its feet again."
