They sent me the script and I thought that there was something very appealing and funny about it. Also, I was familiar with Mike Myers' work in Saturday Night Live, but I did not know the extent to which he would make this creation.
Until I was about 14, I was a fat boy, or at least I looked like a fat boy. I think that being funny was a bit of a defence mechanism for me, so I ended up being a bit of a joker.
Frankly, most of my friends hold very different political beliefs. It's just a funny thing in this country that supposedly you can't sit down and have dinner and enjoy another person's company if you don't have the same beliefs. It's ridiculous.
It's funny, because I was trained as a dramatic actor at New York's Colonnades Theater Lab in the '70s, along with Jeff Goldblum, Danny DeVito and Rhea Perlman. People I worked with there saw a comedian in me. I'm still most at home in comedy.
It's funny, because when I was in college, all my professors said, 'You should do comedy.' And I was like, 'No! No!' But I was able to get my foot in the door through comedy. I'm so grateful to have the opportunity to do it.
I am a very open person, and I'm always nervous of being misconstrued. Sitting in the middle of a restaurant makes me nervous. I feel like I'm being judged. And it's funny that I should feel that way.
It's upsetting that it is such a big deal. I wish it weren't an issue all the time. It's funny that people say it's a departure, because I've been acting since I was a child. I've played three gay roles out of hundreds.
I'm not at all funny. I can do dark comedy pretty well, but straight-up comedy, I don't know. I'm much darker. I've been like that since I was 3 years old.
I show them the funny part, the silly part, the laughing part, the crazy part and then the really deep, deep part where I'm talking from my heart to these people. Because I've been through everything they've been through.
The funny thing is, I'm so used to not caring what anyone says, good or bad, that unfortunately even when people say good things... I wish it made me feel good, but it doesn't.
I was greatly influenced by 'The Goons' and 'Monty Python' reconstituting what comedy was - it could come from a funny word, not just a set up and a pay-off. I liked the zaniness; they were satirical, slightly saucy and very literary in their referen...
I used to like Barbra Streisand films. It was 'Funny Girl' that really turned me on, in a sense, to acting. I remember it specifically being a rainy Saturday afternoon. I couldn't play football, so I stayed in, and I watched 'Funny Girl.'
I just think of myself as a comedian, really. I mean, I talk about being Jewish a lot. It's funny because I do think of myself as Jewish ethnically, but I'm not religious at all. I have no religion.
I had heard before that there were rumors I was gay. It's funny. My cousin gets his hair cut at this place, and one of the guys there told him that Scott Wolf was gay. He didn't realize that he was my cousin.
It's true; I have a skill and it's... it has not related to acting, it's not related to auditions, it's not related to studios, not related to public whim. It's whether I'm funny or not and whether I can entertain people.
I grew up a huge fan of The Three Stooges and Monty Python, so somebody getting slapped in the face with a fish, or falling out of a chair, or running into a door, or tripping over their own feet and eating it, is all stuff I find really, really funn...
Oftentimes, you read these pilot scripts that come through for American work, and they don't sing to you. I've got to be honest, not many of them ignite the flame or give you that burning feeling of, 'Oh, God, I really want to be a part of this.'
It takes time and energy, and if I'm working, then I'd rather flop in front of the telly than put on a tiny dress and work out how to get myself to God knows where. I mean, lazy some would call it.
I was an assistant director for a year, and I realized, 'God, this is a lot of hard work. This is going to take time. So what's the shortcut? What's the better option?' Then thankfully, someone said, 'Why don't you become an actor?'
They killed my character off and as God would have it, just when they told me I would never work again, I got cast in a little program called Roots, and as they would say, the rest is history.
It's just so fragile. The growing sense of 'Oh, God, what am I doing? Am I any good? Will I ever work again?' All those questions of self doubt, they do creep in.
