I'm an artist. Artists don't need permission to work. Regardless of whether I'm acting or not, I write. I write when I'm tired in fact, because I believe your most pure thoughts surface.
After college, I went to Alley Theatre in Houston to work in their apprentice actor program. I thought I was gonna get discovered. It didn't happen. I moved back to Germantown, Tennessee, outside of Memphis, and taught at my old high school.
I really want to be known for my work. That sounds like such a... cliche, and I've thought about how else I can say it to make it sound less hackneyed. But that's what it comes down to... I know people are interested in these things.
I turned down plenty of films which proved to be hugely successful. And, of course, I've also had plenty of experiences where everyone thought we were doing brilliant work and it ended up pretty horrific. Same as any actor, really.
We did 'Jack & Bobby' in the middle of the Kerry/Bush election. It hurt it a little bit. No matter what we did, everyone thought we were advocating for one person over the other. The stuff I work on is more about the people.
'Coraline' is Neil Gaiman's book, it sold a lot, it has a big fan base. It was originally conceived to be live action, but I never really wanted it to be. I always thought that it would work better as an animated film.
To me, as long as we've known each other, I've always thought Mick's most brilliant thing was that he could work in an area two foot square and give a very exciting performance.
When you read a book, you are letting another person distract your thoughts and work your emotions. If they are adept, there's nothing better than turning off and getting lost.
The philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche once wrote that when you look into the darkness of the abyss the abyss looks into you. Probably no other line or thought more inspires or informs my work.
I've got a lot of little compulsive problems, and I've thought about it a lot. And one of the things I ask myself is, 'What are the things I can do that won't hurt me and will help me?' The first answer is work.
I always thought I'd go to university and then get a real job, you know. Now I want to do stuff that really makes me happy. Although I'm still trying to work out what that is. But for me there are always constants.
I thought I had to show people that I would get in early, stay late or even all night, work on holidays. I didn't want to be the rich kid who was along for a free ride.
Archimedes was my ideal. I admired the works of artists, but to my mind, they were only shadows and semblances. The inventor, I thought, gives to the world creations which are palpable, which live and work.
When television came along, I'd already done more than 10 years of radio work and I thought everyone would want me. I sat around waiting for the phone to ring - and it didn't.
I would say that social work began in my mind in the Unitarian Church when I was ten or twelve years old, and I started to do things that I thought would help other people.
I never pictured myself in California. I just thought I would be a character actress in New York on the stage. I never really had that stardom goal; I just wanted to be able to work as an actress and not as a waitress.
I just mean it's very difficult for me to watch my work, in some ways, because I am critical of what I didn't get across or I thought I was making one point.
I work because I have issues and questions and feelings and thoughts that I want to have a look at. I'm not in need of, or wanting, particularly, to know what other folk are up to.
I hadn't thought that women were particularly dangerous golfers. Could that be the reason that the Augusta National Golf club refuses to take down its 'No Women Allowed' sign?
I have no illusions at all about being a sex symbol. None of my former girlfriends ever thought of me that way, and I don't have any packs of women chasing me down the street like a Brad Pitt or someone like that.
Understanding that yes, we are committing more resources than we thought we might be in protecting our homeland and prosecuting a war and so it's understandable that we would be going through a period of deficits.
