Filming for the popular Harry Potter movie series may be over, but actor Daniel Radcliffe is keeping a busy schedule and claims that he doesn’t need much sleep on a daily basis.

Daniel, who started playing the role of Harry the wizard when he was just 11 years old, talked about his passion for work that dates back as far as his childhood. He went on to explain that, despite his hectic life so far, he has never really needed much sleep in his single bed saying: “I don’t really sleep much. I never really have.”

It appears that the 22-year-old isn’t intending to take a break anytime soon, either. One of his latest projects – movie The Woman in Black, based on a novel by Susan Hill – is set to open next month (February 10th).

He told the Sun newspaper (published January 24th): “I’ve always slept, kind of generally speaking, for five hours a night going back since I can remember. That’s why I’m an only child. I didn’t sleep a full night until I was eight years old. I woke up at four in the morning every morning like ‘OK, ready to go. What’s going on?’ That’s just always been me.”

EastEnders actress Pam St Clement, best known for her role as colourful Pat Butcher, has talked about her departure from the hit BBC soap, saying that she got a great night’s sleep in her king size bed after shooting her final scenes.

The 69-year-old will be saying her goodbyes after playing the character for 25 years. The dramatic episode – in which Pat passes away after her battle with Cancer – will be aired on the New Year’s Day episode of the show, true to tradition.

She told the Sun newspaper (published January 1^st): “[H]aving done those last scenes, it was the best night’s sleep I’ve ever had.”

The actress, who first appeared on the show back in 1986, went on to describe the emotions that were in the air when shooting her final scenes.

She told the source: “There were a lot of people watching. Everybody seems to come out of the woodwork so they can say they were there when they saw an actor’s last scene.

“There were tears from quite a lot of people.”

If Coldplay’s impressive performance on the closing episode of this year’s X Factor is anything to go by, Chris Martin puts in the hours when it comes to work. However, the star has admitted to having “a lot of trouble sleeping” in his king size bed when trying to rest.

The Coldplay frontman told BANG Showbiz that when he manages to get some solid shut-eye, he frequently has nightmares of poor performances and has sought the help of a sleep therapist to help him with his problem.

Family man Martin, who is husband to actress Gwyneth Paltrow and father to children Apple, seven, and Moses, five, explained that he has “many more nightmares than dreams”.

He told the source: “I’ll give you a classic dream I had last night. We were playing on Letterman and I was in a different key to everyone else. David Letterman came on and said, ‘Can you stop? This is not very good. Can you do the other song?’ And then, we start doing the other one and my shoe falls off.”

Hollywood actresses Nicole Kidman and Naomi Watts are to contribute their unique Aussie drawls to a new series of audio books dedicated to aiding sleep, according to recent reports.

Reading before bed is a tried-and-tested method of encouraging sleep on restless nights, and in an article by The Sydney Morning Herald published today (October 4th), it is revealed that a star-studded line-up of celebrities will offer their trademark voices to do the reading for you.

Kidman, 44, is to read Virginia Woolf’s novel To the Lighthouse, which is based in early twentieth century Isle of Skye, Scotland. Meanwhile, King Kong star Watts, 43, will offer her talents in the reading of Summer by Edith Wharton; another popular classic that depicts early upper-class New York society.

These Audible.com releases will host an impressive array of celebrities including Samuel L Jackson, Kate Winslet, Anne Hathaway, Colin Firth, Meg Ryan, Susan Sarandon and Kim Basinger.

People often struggle to get the most out of the space in their bedroom, though with a few easy tips, it’s easy to stay on top of things and keep your sleeping space feeling open, fresh and relaxing.

Firstly, remove as much clutter as possible. The more items that are in your bedroom, the more cramped it feels. If you look around the room and can’t see the floor, you have too much furniture or personal belongings. Try to use any unnecessary furniture in another room of the house and remove large collections of personal belongings to create the illusion of space.

Buy furniture that instead maximises wall space; small bedrooms are more suited to shelves, flatter wardrobes and other items that allow you to have floor space in front of them. From here, it is important to scale decor by the size of a bed, which will likely be the focal point of the room. If you have a large bed, get table lamps and decorations that are in proportion to it.

Finally, choose colour schemes wisely. Dark shades in a small room can make bedrooms feel closer and more oppressive; try to keep them to accessories like pillows, rugs and accents in drapery or bed linen. Lighter colours on walls will give a greater illusion of space.

Young children who are exposed to violent images on TV and computer games can experience serious sleep disruption, according to a new study.

Research conducted by the Seattle Children’s Research Institute in Seattle, which is published in the July issue of Pediatrics, suggests that children sleep poorly if exposed to this kind of screen time.

What’s more, the study which used 612 sleep and media diaries prepared by parents to assess sleep and media viewing, found that any sort of viewing time in the evening had a detrimental effect on sleep.

“The bottom line is that we see violent media use [in the daytime] and any screen time at all in the evening is associated with a negative impact on sleep in kids of this age,” said Michelle Garrison, PhD, and colleagues at the Seattle Children’s Research Institute in Seattle.

The diaries showed that children were viewing a TV screen or a computer for around 73 minutes on average every day.

We all love the convenience of modern gadgets, but our use of technology could be preventing us from getting enough sleep according to research.

A poll conducted on behalf of the US National Sleep Foundation found that 95 per cent of Americans use at least one kind of electronic item before bed, with six in ten admitting that they use their laptops or computers within the hour before they hit the sack at least a few nights per week.

Experts fear these late night sessions could be detrimental to sleep levels, with 24 per cent of Americans reporting that they rarely or never get enough sleep on weeknights.

Charles Czeisler, PhD, MD, Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women’s Hospital said: “Artificial light exposure between dusk and the time we go to bed at night suppresses release of the sleep-promoting hormone melatonin, enhances alertness and shifts circadian rhythms to a later hour — making it more difficult to fall asleep”.

Research conducted to coincide with World Book Day last week has revealed that two-thirds of adults drift off to sleep after reading six and a half pages of a standard-sized paperback.

A poll of 3,000 Brits carried out by the publisher Routledge found that the average Brit reads 2,134 words before sloping off to slumberland – perhaps a tad more than the term ‘light bedtime reading’ suggests.

Intellectual books such as autobiographies were said to be the preferred option for promoting sleep and helping people to drop off.

A spokesman for Routledge said:  ”A good book is the ideal form of escapism, and is the perfect antidote to a long, hard and stressful day at the office.

”Reading also exercises the grey matter, which may explain its soporific effects  – especially at bedtime.”