Helen Mirren: A Life of Packing, Unpacking, and Conquering Insecurity

The actress told variety.com: "The roller coaster adventure is the most exciting."

Mirren has always considered herself to be a "rogue and a vagabond", and she feels proud of what she's achieved in her career on stage and screen, reports femalefirst.co.uk.

Mirren said: "I identify more with that side of my profession than anything grand or, for lack of a better word, posh. I started in the theatre in a communal sense, where you are all in it together, you know. It wasn't a star system or anything like that. That was my first love of performing, of telling stories...."

She added: "My whole life has been spent now, not so much camping out by the side of the street, but certainly in hotels. My whole life has been packing and unpacking."

Despite her successes, Mirren has always struggled with self-doubts, too. She had said that actors and actresses are often more insecure than the public may think, reports femalefirst.co.uk.

She explained: "The thing that drives me is my insecurity, actually, really more than anything, but at the same time, I guess self-knowledge is a help in that sense."

"I'm curious about the world in general, and I've always felt the only way to overcome lack of self-confidence is to stop thinking about yourself and think about other people or the world around you, or, you know, other things that go outward rather than go inward.

"The way to deal with it is to look outward. And also, I think a lot of actors have that because it seems contradictory that, you're so unself confident that you put yourself in front of other people. There is a reason for which often people become actors, and it is related to finding it hard to negotiate in the real world."

Last year, Mirren said that she always finds starting a new job to be a "nerve-racking" experience.

- IANS