Napoleon had been fighting this army of slaves and free people in Haiti and it depleted his forces. And after the Revolution, when the French were driven out, they stopped and sold this big chunk of North America to the Americans for very little mone...
I wanted to make money very fast, and I was completely confused after college. I didn't know what career options I had. And then I had this entry point in the film industry, and I thought, 'If this is where the fast money is going to come from, let's...
I just thought acting would be something to help out with my student loans, but my first year as an actress, I made more money than my parents. That's when I realized it could turn into a career. After that, I put everything I had into it.
After 'Sports' came out in the fall of 1983, everything changed for me. Four of the album's singles became top-10 hits, and by the end of June in 1984, the album was No. 1 on the Billboard chart. It was quite a ride, and for the first time I had enou...
My first time performing was in the black box theater of my high school's basement as a member of 'Clownaz,' the school's improv team. We charged money for tickets, saying the proceeds went to our school's recycling program. Then, immediately after t...
After I graduated from Brandeis, I took all the money I had in the world, which was $5,000, and I made a short film. I made every mistake you could possibly make. It was a total disaster as a piece of work, and yet, you know, it was ambitious in some...
After the sale of Celtel, I really wanted to give the money back, and I had a number of choices - to go and buy masses of blankets and baby milk or to go into Darfur or Congo. That would have been very nice actually, but it's just like an aspirin: it...
I thought I was going to be a theater actor. I moved to New York after college and did some plays and worked a lot. Once the realities of living as a theatrical actor hit me, I realized I wanted to start making a little bit of money and not have to b...
Trust the young. Young people have a lot to contribute, but generation after generation, those who reach power protect that power rather than teach others how to attain it. I resolved that if I ever became successful, I would trust the young.
As parents and as consumers, we have the right and the power to pressure the entertainment industry to respond to our needs. Americans, after all, should insist that every corporate giant - whether it produces chemicals or records - accept responsibi...
On a summer night it can be lovely to sit around outside with friends after dinner and, yes, read poetry to each other. Keats and Yeats will never let you down, but it's differently exciting to read the work of poets who are still walking around out ...
After I left the convent, for 15 years I was worn out with religion, I wanted nothing whatever to do with it. I felt disgusted with it. If I saw someone reading a religious book on a train, I'd think, how awful.
One idea I explore in my stand-up show is whether, if you try looking at the universe rationally and avoid coping mechanisms like mysticism or religion, you can still be happy knowing you are going to die after a brief time on this spinning ball.
I know children regress after vaccination because it happened to my own son. Why aren't there any tests out there on the safety of how vaccines are administered in the real world, six at a time? Why have only two of the 36 shots our kids receive been...
In any relationship that comes to an end, there's never just a baseline reason why. You say, 'Oh, I broke up with my girlfriend.' Someone says, 'Why?' You say, 'Well, you got three hours? And then maybe after I tell you my version, you've got to talk...
I didn't know anything about romance novels until a friend suggested that I try writing one. After I read a few, I realized that my favorite part of fiction had always been the relationship aspect.
So after the Lewinsky scandal, everything changed, and we moved from using the Bible to address the moral issues of our time, which were social, to moral issues of our time that were very personal. I have continued that relationship up until the pres...
People expect me to be dark and gloomy, then write that I'm a jolly chap, and after all, that is what I am. I think it's a case of an absolute romantic naivety that there should be a parallel between the work and the artist.
In the early 1940s, as a young teenager, I was utterly appalled by the racist and jingoist hysteria of the anti-Japanese propaganda. The Germans were evil, but treated with some respect: They were, after all, blond Aryan types, just like our imaginar...
After I had this idea to be Bill Nye the Science Guy, I wore straight ties the first couple times, and then I got this thing going and I started wearing bow ties.
I always liked show biz and got to make a few training films at Boeing. Soon after, I got the idea of a science show geared toward kids, around ages 8 through 12.
