My mother is the most incredible woman on this entire Earth, and she's so giving and loving and sweet and she always raised me how to forgive and forget and move on. She's the catalyst behind it all, my mom is. And I'm 100% a momma's boy!
I honestly don't even know how I got into acting. It happened so quickly because my mom and sister used to do commercials, and apparently when I was little I would unbuckle myself from the stroller and crash their auditions.
As a mom, you have all these situations you go through, and you're like, 'What is going on? Is this normal? Is this a phase? Or what is this?' and then you feel silly for asking questions because you think, 'I'm a mom - I'm supposed to know these thi...
I was watching TV one day, and I'm like, 'How did those people get on TV? I'm gonna try that. Hey, mom, I want to be on TV!' And she's like, 'OK, let's get you an agent.'
I started singing when I was about 3 and dancing soon after. Mom just started looking for outlets where I could perform and availed herself of any opportunity she could in the mountains of North Carolina in the '70s.
I wish my mother had left me something about how she felt growing up. I wish my grandmother had done the same. I wanted my girls to know me.
I have my name Cory on my left arm, and I have my mom's name on my right with a cross. She passed away while I was still in high school, so I got that on my right arm.
I think my first big purchase was actually for my mom. She had one of those '90s TVs in her living room that's like a 10x10 brick, so I purchased her a flatscreen for her living room.
My mom grew up in Idaho, went to Brigham Young University: they're very Molly Mormon. And my father is, like, first generation Albanian, and his parents lived in Southey and grew up in downtown Boston. My parents are complete opposites.
You don't realize how hard it is to live on your own. But there's no mom to do your laundry, and make you dinner and to do things for you, and you don't think about little things like buying paper towels and salt.
I had massive anxiety as a child. I was in therapy. From 8 to 10, I was borderline agora-phobic. I could not leave my mom's side. I don't really have panic attacks anymore, but I had really bad anxiety.
I am compelled to continuously see the bright side. It is in my DNA. My kids look at me and say: 'Mom, you're so happy!' And I do feel happy. I feel joyful inside. I can't explain it.
My mom and I were super tight. I think she really wanted me to be an artist, you know? She used to like to tell people she wanted to be Beethoven's mother. That was her thing. She wanted to be the mother of this person.
My first language is both English and Spanish. My mom was raised in Los Angeles, so with her we spoke English, but my father was born in Cuba, so with him we spoke Spanish.
I'm not sure what I want to do when I grow up, or if I'm sure I ever want to grow up. I'm sure there are people that wish I would, but you know, my mom will get over it.
I can't watch myself in interviews. I feel like I look like a wreck. My mom is always calling me and going, 'Stop fidgeting,' and it's like, 'You have no idea what it's like, Mom.'
When I was a child, I wanted to be an actor, but I had really bad buckteeth. I didn't want to get braces, but my mom said I couldn't be an actor if I didn't get the braces. So, I got the braces.
I showed my mom the movie then I told her the movie got bought and that it was gonna be shown in theatres and be on video. Everyone was really psyched about it. Everyone in my little town of hounds started to call me movie star.
My mom worked as a psychiatric social worker. She was interested in people, and I guess I am, too. So we would talk about the people that we knew, and why they behaved the way they did.
My mom is very structured. She gets up, she does her prayers, and she eats her oatmeal with blueberries and Greek yogurt, and she has her prayer list, and she doesn't worry too much about things.
We've got activists all across the country like the members of the Million Mom March organization, some of their leaders are here tonight. We're phone banking congressional offices and pursuing editorial boards.
