The worst thing a man can admit is 'I'm not 100 percent fulfilled by my family.' But it doesn't mean he doesn't love his family. I love my family, but I still want to work; I still want challenges. It took me a while to fall in love with the responsibility of family life, and it was a deep thing when I did.
I used to fly around the stage without strings or camera tricks. That took seven years to create.
In the summer of 1988, my father took me up to look at the remains of our home, the dream house that he'd built. It was my first time since our family left four years earlier. Political and obscene graffiti covered the half-torn walls. There was no ceiling and surprisingly no floor: the parquet, the stone, the marble, all looted.
When the movie was done, Number Five was crated up. Eric took him over to Germany; displayed him over there because Germans really liked this movie. It was very popular with them.
It's funny because I never studied, I never took a class. So everything I do is very innate and organic; I don't really have words for it. It is a communion with spirit. I don't get in my own way and allow the character to do what it's going to do.
The thing that is cool about my come up is that I dealt with fame and having money gradually. It didn't happen overnight. It was something that took a while to happen. It was something that humbled me and made me very appreciative of my blessings more than I would have been if it had happened faster and easier.
When I got to 'Saturday Night Live,' it was a lot like going from pre-school to Harvard, and it took a long time to figure stuff out.
The Busted thing happened when I was 16. I saw an opportunity, took it and it was better than being at school. It was a fun job but I'd never claim Busted was anything other than a pop band.
I attended a post-college program in L.A. for Music Business and Production. Took several courses involving Music Production, Arrangement, and Songwriting.
The first time that I was elected I was called the Judas Iscariot of the black community because I took a stand that was inconsistent of cutting across the grain.
It took me years of attempts and failed drafts before I finally wrote the elegies I needed to write.
My dad is a big extrovert - he's a doctor - but he always loved Shakespeare, and he took us to tons of theater.
Before we took down the tree each year, Dad would always say a prayer that we would be together the next Christmas. I cling to that prayer, which serves as a reminder that it's important to be grateful in the present for the people you love because, well, you never know.
What did Sept. 11 do? It took me from 60-70 percent name recognition as mayor of New York to about 90 percent. Of course it had an impact. But it's not the only reason I was successful.
I didn't intend to be an actress. It was one of many things I was interested in, and it just took off. I was an actress between the ages of 18 and 22, and it was a wonderful, fun thing to do, but it wasn't what I intended long term. I parked acting a long time ago.
I was pretty young, but because of that first record, 'Cole Espanol,' we took our first trip - well, my first trip - to Mexico.
I didn't realize I wanted to write about D.C. until after 2000. Even though I was a comedy writer, I stayed away from that subject on purpose. It took attaining some distance and perspective.
I started as a model in Holland and Chanel took me to New York when I was 19, after which I decided to stay.
If I were to do a movie about Apollo 13, I'd be at NASA studying what it took to go into space. It's part of your job to go deep, to interview the right people.
You know, even U2 took a little time off, and then they came back with a new sound.
Nothing has changed that much, even during filmmaking for 'The Descendants.' I wrote. I took the kids to school. I cleaned the house. And I had dinner with George Clooney.
It took me years to actually get comfortable on the stage. I prefer the intimacy of screen; it comes easier to me. In theater, you have to be louder and bigger - that was harder for many years in my teens. But now I've conquered that. I eat up the stage. I love it.
I don't even like to talk about it. I hated being a number and not merely because I was a very small one. I let them bellow at me for just as long as it took me to find enough pluck to bellow back at them.
My grandmother taught me how to read, very early, but she taught me to read just the way she taught herself how to read - she read words rather than syllables. And as a result of that, when I entered school, it took me a long time to learn how to write.
I always feel that in politics, you have a bridle on. Well, I took the bridle off. And I tell you, it felt pretty good.
I took my time to learn the craft and procedure. I wanted to do some substantial work first in cinema.
I like everything in this iPhone, iPod world where you can do everything all the time. Back in my time, you bought a vinyl record when you were a kid and took it home, and it took a bit of effort to actually get it out of the thing and not scratch it.
Steve Jobs came back to Apple in 1997 - the iPod came out 4 years later. 3 years after that is the first time his market cap grew. It took 7 years.
'For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge' took a year to record; that's why the playing on it might sound somewhat labored. 'Balance,' on the other hand, was written and recorded in only four months, so the whole process was quicker and more immediate.
'Impressionism' was the name given to a certain form of observation when Monet, not content with using his eyes to see what things were or what they looked like as everybody had done before him, turned his attention to noting what took place on his own retina (as an oculist would test his own vision).
By the 2010s, almost everybody in the developed world, it seemed, had a powerful digital device that took little or no special skills or training to use.
A lot of people say that I took the first shot for Bitcoin. The first person to walk through the door always gets shot, and then everyone else can come through.
Ninety percent of the time, you're going to hear no. It took me seven years to make 'Once Upon a Time... When We Were Colored.' Nobody wanted to see the movie made. I got the movie made.
The people in Washington are getting rich with our money. Under President Barack Obama, the federal government swelled to record size, and it took more and more of our money to pay for it. Who benefitted? Not Missouri farmers or workers.
I acted in theater and I took film classes when I was 12 and just obsessed over it. I loved it and spent hours and hours in the film studio learning and watching.
It was probably my parents who inspired me most. My father was a scientist and answered my scientific questions, while my mother took me on walks and showed me birds and plants. She also took me out at night and showed me the constellations and the aurora.
