As a writer, my main objective is to tell the story urgently - as if whispering it into one ear - and to know the characters intimately.
I want to try something different in Hollywood, to tell the audience I am not just an actor star - I am an actor, too.
I'm a storyteller; that's what exploration really is all about. Going to places where others haven't been and returning to tell a story they haven't heard before.
It's hard to build a brand, competitively, and tell people what you do as well.
In the '20s they were telling us we'd all have our own private plane and take vacations to the moon.
You never ask why you've been fired because if you do, they're liable to tell you.
I am not comfortable telling people I am trying stand-up because to me that implies confidence. I'm - well, I'm not.
People tell me, 'You better lose weight if you want to run for mayor.' I said, 'I got the Chris Christie look.'
If we turn to palaeontology to tell us about our biological evolution it is to prehistory that we look for evidence of the evolution of specifically human patterns of behaviour.
The biggest thing people tell me is that I'll be jaded real soon and that the allure of filmmaking will lose its magic. Not necessarily the fame, but that special thing you create onscreen.
The first year I was on the show, it took an interviewer about 45 minutes to get it out of me that I even had a dog, and even then I wouldn't tell him the dog's name.
Let's go tell everyone we meet that, when the American dream is at stake, you want Barack Obama in charge.
I've... been accused of being involved with every man I'm ever seen with or worked with. Maybe I have, maybe I ain't. I never tell if I have.
I'm just an observer of Java, and where Microsoft wants to go with C# is too early to tell.
I can't tell you if the use of force in Iraq today will last five days, five weeks or five months, but it won't last any longer than that.
Even if you're in the thick of revising another work, write something new. Something small. It's important to keep telling yourself stories.
No one ever tells a story to help you figure out where to go when a door closes on you.
How can you tell somebody who is pursuing happiness that they're somehow not American when that was the very first promise that America made?
A true writer should be able to write about any color. It's the story they tell that should affect people, not the race.
Here's what I tell people now when they come to my shows: 'First of all, thank you for stimulating the economy, or at least my economic package.'
It is easy to tell confidence from pride. Confidence lifts, encourages, helps, and is full of gratitude. Pride demeans, mocks, destroys, and is bitter and resentful.
