When I was in junior high, a foreign-history teacher started a theater class. So I got my feet wet there and through high school, so I was very fascinated with acting as a means of expression.
There is a shortage of teachers but the January 2001 schools census showed that teacher numbers were at their highest level than at any time since 1984 - and 11,000 higher than 1997.
I remember in school once the teacher gave us a speech about anyone can make it if they try, and then she looked at me and said. 'I don't know what you are going to do, Georgie.'
As the daughter of a schoolteacher, I feel very strongly that the most important thing in school takes place right there in that classroom, and the interaction between the teacher and the child.
I never had to learn English, French and German because I was brought up as all three languages. I had a private French teacher before I even went to school. That helped a lot.
As a teacher I realize that what one learns in school doesn't serve for very much at all, that the only thing one can really learn is self-understanding, and this is something that can't be taught.
There happened to be guitar classes at the college, and there was a guitar teacher there with whom I used to play. In addition, I also would go out into country schools and teach little kids basic guitar and singing a few times a week.
I really enjoyed hanging out with some of the teachers. This one chemistry teacher, she liked hanging out. I liked making explosives. We would stay after school and blow things up.
I kind of fell backwards into acting. I was studying to be a high school teacher. I look now and I understand completely, or actually barely, how much work it is to be a teacher. It's an incredible amount of work.
Think of your favorite teacher you ever had in school: the one who made it the most fun to go to class. They surprise you. They keep you guessing. They keep you coming back, wanting to know what's going to happen next.
If you told me when I was a teen that I would end up being a teacher, I would have said you're out of your mind, because quite frankly I hated school.
I am really not of the school of naturalism. I like style, and you can use more style in theater than in film roles. I love to sink my teeth into a part.
I'm kind of old-school and love nothing more than sitting, opening a book, and reading it. But I also love listening to audio books.
I was performing at a New Jersey high school, and I asked a class of 2,000 students, 'How many of you love mathematics?' and only one hand went up. And that was the hand of the maths teacher!
I have a love for colorful things. I'm a fashion maximalist. I come from the school of people who look at the decoration in Marie Antoinette's bedroom, and think 'Why so reserved?'
I was in a band in high school and college and I always had a love for music, but I didn't go to a conservatory or anything like that. I was fairly self-taught.
I'm from the Bob Wills and the Little Richard school of music. Bob Wills did what the hell he thought, Little Richard did what he thought, and those were my big influences.
My grandfather was a massive influence in my music. Growing up, he would play a lot of old-school records to me. A lot of jazz and swing music, actually, growing up.
I was a kid who got picked on in school, and now the guys beating up those kids were wearing red caps and using my music to fuel that aggression. But if they listen to the lyrics, the aggression is targeted at them.
For me, music was the only reason I went to school. I was kind of a street kid, in a lot of trouble committing crimes and stuff. Music gave me something to focus on.
Apart from two periods of intense study, of music between the ages of 12 and 14 and of mathematics between the ages of 14 and 16, I coasted, daydreaming, through most of my school years.
