“The vampire craze is kind of fascinating. We’re interested in the idea of immorality and I think we’re drawn to people or creatures who can give in to those base impulses and just be bad and not feel bad about it.”

I went to Julliard and we did a lot of mask work there, and I remember thinking in class, ‘When am I ever going to use this?

Maybe I’m naive, but I subscribe to the idea that nobody is actually making strategic decisions about their career. Trying to do that would be like playing three-card monte on Canal Street.

I’d consider myself a flailing comedy writer.

I only play projects with weird interpretations of presidents.

You learn history in school, and you have a reverential feeling toward it. But by being irreverent, it feels current.

I thought I was going to be a ballet dancer for awhile there. I had a good teacher at Interlochen, this arts’ academy in Michigan, who taught me the importance of storytelling, and I really responded to that. It seemed like a long shot, but I always play the long odds.

Every job is an opportunity to be a better person.

I’m just looking for things to steal [on working with great actors]. It’s like going back to acting school. When you’re around people that do it well and you get your head out of your ass, you can really learn something.

You never can take for granted that you have a job.

You never know when you’ll have a bad idea for a worse joke.

People are still people, and they make their decisions based on their life experiences and their beliefs. You really can’t divorce the two. It’s important to fight against stereotypes and oversimplifications in very complex people.

Even the greatest actors have had dry spells where they’ve wondered if they were going to work again.

You think of George Washington, this man who was larger than life, and in some ways he was. But at the same time, he’s just a person.

Don’t trust somebody that don’t have a troubled period.

The place I feel most at home is when I have health insurance. I really don’t care how I get it, whether it’s on film, or television or waiting tables, you know?

You know, 1% of us is in the armed forces, protecting the other 99, and they’re all volunteers.

I think the performances that really communicate with me are the ones where I don’t feel like I’m watching someone and thinking: “They’re doing some really good acting.”

Laura had an instinctive feel for music and melody, and her delivery was sensational.

Breathing is something vital to peoples lives. If you see that Dhamma practice is vital to your life, then you will feel that breathing and practising the Dhamma are equally important.

Exposition suggests a great trust in the reader, and this expression of trust makes a book feel tender.

If it’s putting on a great dance record and rocking out in your apartment, do it. If kissing someone for 10 minutes makes you feel confident, do it.

Joy is what we all seek. It is an energy more powerful than food. But without love we can not feel true joy.

Whenever we feel that we are definitely right, so much so that we refuse to open up to anything or anybody else, right there we are wrong. It becomes wrong view.

I don’t want to do what my idols did… I want to do more than they did. And I feel like I’m on my way.