I wrote 'Ain't It Cool? Hollywood's Redheaded Stepchild Speaks Out,' because in doing hundreds and hundreds of interviews over the past six and a half years, I was tired of the story being half told or a third told or erroneously told.
You don't want to be too cool. But you don't want to be too dorky. Still, I find it so much better to see a guy at a club being a dork, and having fun, than trying to be sexy.
I wonder what it's like to be from a state that is spread across a few islands way out in the Pacific Ocean, only added to the United States in 1959. Not only that but to be the birthplace of America's first black president? Pretty cool, I bet.
It's great that people are basically spending their two weeks of vacation to come out and be with us in some weird part of the world. And I think we owe it to them to take 'em to some cool places.
Almost any film that you do is an opportunity to open you up and make you more aware of an area that you might not be thinking about. That's what is kind of cool, or one of the cool things about this profession.
I once owned a really, really ugly pair of white leather boots. They were so bad. It was back in the '80s! It was just a really tacky fashion choice when I was in middle school, and I thought it was cool. I'm really embarrassed.
Honestly, I would think I would go way back to Biblical times and be one of the guys who saw Jesus' Sermon on the Mount. It would be so cool to see what he was really like in person.
Most of my guitars have been instruments that look cool. I'm not picky. I never think, 'Oh, this neck isn't made of ebony,' or, 'These strings don't feel correct.' It doesn't matter too much.
Acting is sort of an extension of childhood. You get to play all of these roles and have so much fun. Playing an athlete would be so cool. Or where you get to shoot guns, ride horses. I wouldn't turn down any of that.
The cool thing about Kyle Killen, he writes really defined characters. I was a big fan of 'Awake' and also 'Lone Star.' I just think that he's a really, really special writer, and complex and deep, and a really smart dude.
Violence is a very ugly thing. Violence is often so casual on film, and made to look so cool and so sexy, but violence is a repulsive, repugnant act that human beings inflict on each other. It shouldn't seem to be cool and sexy, ever really.
Sixth grade was definitely a hard year for me. I got left out because I didn't go to any of the parties or hang out with the 'cool kids.' I was focusing on my academics. I wasn't allowed to go to any of the parties.
I'm afraid one thing - I don't like heights. Heights bug me out. I'm not cool with heights. I refuse to do a comedy show 12 stories up. I'm fearless about everything else.
I'm a mirror. If you're cool with me, I'm cool with you, and the exchange starts. What you see is what you reflect. If you don't like what you see, then you've done something. If I'm standoffish, that's because you are.
I went to a Cal Tech party after the 'Facebook' movie came out, and there were kids in dark rooms coding because it was cool again. That movie made it cool to sit in a room at a party and write code.
Even in high school, I had friends that I didn't know were gay until years later. I'd find out on Facebook or something and be like, 'Oh, that explains some things,' or 'Wow, no wonder they were so cool.'
A huge thing for me growing up was going to see my favorite bands and feeling like, 'Okay, cool, they proved themselves and did things in a special way.' That's the most important thing.
What is more important than the name is that people know that I really like acting, I enjoy it and I want people to know that I am serious. The name thing: I will always be L.L. Cool J.
Men, when they fight in movies, it's a very different style. Harrison Ford was so cool when he had the whip, and Bruce Lee was such an artist that you couldn't take your eyes off of him.
I was trying to break out of the suburbs, and when I did break out, I don't think I took my whole self with me - I think I played a role of being too cool and hip.
When I was working on pictures with my father, there were a couple leading ladies to whom I wish I'd expressed how I felt rather than being too cool or too shy.