Regardless of age, regardless of position, regardless of the business we happen to be in, all of us need to understand the importance of branding. We are CEOs of our own companies: Me, Inc. To be in business today, our most important job is to be hea...
Race and gender definitely came up, occasionally, in my life at work. But the bigger challenge that I had was age. I took roles earlier in my career than people expected, and so a lot of what I got was, 'Do you actually know enough to do this?'
I don't ascribe to the idea of the ivory tower composer who sits alone in a room composing his masterpieces and then comes down from Mount Sinai with the tablets. It doesn't work like that. The job of a composer is putting something down on a piece o...
It's a good time for me, but it's only recently I've become comfortable in my job. At the start, it's hard having the nerve to call yourself an actor, let alone doing it. I gave myself two years after drama school, and if I didn't make it, then I'd g...
People who work full-time in America should not have to live in poverty - simple as that. Too many jobs don't pay enough to get by, let alone get ahead. Too many people are finding the rungs on the ladder of opportunity further and further apart.
When 'Buffy the Vampire Slayer' premiered on the WB Network in 1996, American culture was in trouble. Americans were bowling alone, pursuing individual interests to the detriment of the communal good. Business leaders were celebrating creativity and ...
I run from Horatio Street down just past Battery Park City and back. It's amazing to run and see the Statue of Liberty and the ferries coming in. People think if you're not near Central Park, there's nowhere to go, but there's a whole ecosystem happe...
What's amazing is, if young people understood how doing well in school makes the rest of their life so much interesting, they would be more motivated. It's so far away in time that they can't appreciate what it means for their whole life.
I've worked on films where the budgets are almost limitless and you're in trailers that are bigger than a hotel room. You're taken care of and the food is amazing, the quality of the job is amazing and then you work on smaller things but it never dic...
My parents traveled a lot, so my grandparents practically raised me. My grandmother and I really bonded in the kitchen. She's this amazing southern cook, and I would always help her - whether it was cracking eggs or stirring the green beans. It takes...
I think shoppers are looking for newness and creativity. Look at C. Wonder, for instance. They're dancing in our stores. We don't believe in retail like retail was done in the past. We believe in disrupting the whole environment, offering them amazin...
In grade school I was taught that the United States is a melting pot. People from all over the world come here for freedom and to pursue a better life. They arrive with next to nothing, work incredibly hard, learn a new language and new customs, and ...
I'd love to do something with Kelly Clarkson because she's been a monumental influence on me. I love how she handles her celebrity. She's not in the tabloids a lot but everyone knows and respects her because she's got an amazing voice. That's somethi...
I left my job in the fall, and now I can set my life up around writing instead of squeezing writing into my day; it's amazing to have that time, and I feel very lucky.
As an editor, I read Charlotte Rogan's amazing debut novel, 'The Lifeboat,' when it was still in manuscript. I read it in one night, and I really wanted my company to publish it, but we lost it to another house. It's such a wonderful combination of b...
I had one of those light bulb 'a ha' moments while screening 'Good Will Hunting' in Camp David in 1998 - Madeleine Albright and the Clintons were there, and I just became really inspired by all of these amazing people. I left the screening asking mys...
I was nervous. I was thinking, 'Gee, he's Ralph Fiennes. What an amazing actor, and I can have this scene with him.' But I enjoyed it, you know. That's what I got into acting to do - to push myself and see if I can do these things.
Sometimes it's not always about what you can see or hear but what's under the hood of a game that's most impressive. Between those thousands and thousands of lines of code, magic happens. Sometimes the most amazing feats of gaming wizardry happen wit...
I have no problem with bands using participant financing schemes like Kickstarter and such. I've said many times that I think they're part of the new way bands and their audience interact and they can be a fantastic resource, enabling bands to do thi...
In America, celebrities who go to see your show will come backstage and introduce themselves. Meeting Annette Bening and Ethan Hawke that way was amazing, but when Tom Hanks came, it was really special - I've loved him since I first saw him in 'Big!'
Wal-Mart is an amazing success story. What I particularly admire very much about the late Sam Walton was his policy of valuing his employees. Giving value to employees is very rare in the retail industry. I also admire the strategies Walton used to b...
