Working on The West Wing was similar in many ways to my experience on M*A*S*H, because you had people willing to work late at night to get it just right.
We’re highly social animals – I’m told by scientists that what makes us different from other animals is an acute social awareness, which is what has made us so successful.
Laugh at yourself, but don’t ever aim your doubt at yourself. Be bold. When you embark for strange places, don’t leave any of yourself safely on shore. Have the nerve to go into unexplored territory.
I’m very interested in the improvisation because one of the things I do is to help train scientists to communicate in a better way and more personal way when they’re making a presentation, and I use improvisation to do that.
It’s nice to have more time to work on the character, and to have big scenes to play. But if there’s something playable there, and if it’s interesting to do, then that’s nice.
I can sing in tune now, but I have to work really hard on it to make sure that I don’t exercise one of my great talents, which is the ability to sing in three keys at the same time.
