I wanted to be Cher for a long time, but not for the singing. I just thought she was so cool. I wanted her long hair, and I wanted to weigh five pounds.
I've been out with lots of other artists opening for them on tour, and you just learn that none of their success came easy - it was all hard work for them, and you have to buckle down and get ready for the hard work yourself, too.
Musically, I try not to box things in. I try to just play around this spectrum of influences: soul, jazz, and hip-hop.
I just want to go on making movies, and some of them will be completely meaningless, except, of course, to me.
The neighbors could be as mad as they want, but I'm not running a business at the house. It's just a location. It will never get me out of here, because I don't have offices set up at my house, and that's what the township thinks.
I play guitar a bit. I'm trying to learn drums - I feel like I can play violin. I've never tried, but I just feel like I can.
More and more, the things we do in real life will end up as Facebook posts. And while we may be consoled by the fact that most of this stuff is being posted just to our friends, it only takes one friend to share that information with his or her friends to start a viral chain.
Once we decided not to get pregnant, I snapped back into work mode, and now I have just been really enjoying my career.
The mystified idea I had of Israel - the demonization of Israel - it just wasn't true.
I grew up in Chillum Heights in the Washington, D.C. area., and it was never a garden spot. When guys go, 'Hey, when I grew up, my neighborhood was tough, and it was this and that'... the reality is that it was just a terribly sad place. And thank God, I was able to escape it.
I love raccoons. I had a raccoon figurine collection as a kid, and I now have two movies with 'Ranger Rick' jokes in them. I love 'em. They come in my back yard all the time, and we just stare at each other like a couple of idiots.
I just don't believe in joking about violence anymore.
Having spent so much of my life with Shakespeare's world, passions and ideas in my head and in my mouth, he feels like a friend - someone who just went out of the room to get another bottle of wine.
I am not concentrating on any industry but just taking up good offers, which gives me scope to perform.
I think mascara is a must. If I'm going to wear makeup somewhere, and I'm doing it, it's usually really simple - it's just mascara and maybe a tiny bit of eyeshadow, but that's it.
A strong sense of humor, a really awesome personality, and maturity is also really important in a boyfriend. I tend to only be attracted to older guys for that reason. I just love guys who have a really strong sense of who they are.
There are some good people. But a good chunk of them will lie for no reason at all - it'll be ten o'clock and they'll tell you it's nine. You're looking at the clock and you can't even fathom why they're lying. They just lie because that's what they do.
Elections aren't just about who votes but who doesn't vote.
If you are a serious writer or just a normal one, in one way or another, you are writing in the service of freedom. All writers know, understand, or dream that their work will be in the service of freedom.
I'm not a geek about equipment, I just know what I like.
What's cool about the beatboxing is I was so afraid to sing in front of my peers, my parents, anybody. I just wouldn't do it. So in sixth grade, I would turn to beatboxing because it made me feel better. Like, I can beatbox 'Drop It Like It's Hot.' Doing that a bunch of times eventually gave me the confidence to sing in front of people.
Acting is something I love. It's a great craft that I have a lot of respect for. But I don't think it's any greater challenge than teaching 8-year-olds or any other career. In my life, I try not to make it more important than it is and I just hope that rubs off on the people around me.
I don't think I understood guitar rock as well as I probably should have. I don't think I understood bands like Led Zeppelin. In their era, everyone had such a regard for them because of them ushering in rock n' roll and this larger-than-life lifestyle. But then they had these songs that would just not stop. I didn't fully get it.
There's no one else I would rather have as my manager than my mom because I know that she has our best interests at heart. Sometimes, it's hard to separate manager mode from mom mode. I think as our manager, my mom will get more emotional about situations than she would if she was just our manager.
When it comes down to the music, it's just you and the microphone. It's not you and the record execs.
People always say to me, 'You're really attractive - in an unusual way.' No one ever just says, 'You're attractive.'
I just don't believe in abortion, period. But I would never take away a woman's right to choose what's good for her body. But I still believe that when you do have an abortion, still inside, you go through a lot of stuff. It tears away at your spirit and your soul. So I don't think people think about that.
I just don't feel respected in the political process as a large donor or as a citizen voter. I just feel patronized. Everything I get is like, 'Hey, you couldn't possibly - it's too complex and sophisticated what really goes on,' and, 'Hey, leave it to us, and we will go and represent you and fight the good fight, and just give us money.'
You know what, I'm happy to say that everything outside of 'Dexter' feels like a vacation, and I don't mean to say anything negative about the show. It's just a different kind of work. Emotionally it's taxing and complicated, and that's a great thing.
Once I'm on the phone, I just can't say no. I sometimes find myself doing things for three or four organizations in one day.
When you're wearing a motorcycle helmet, people don't know who you are. So I just wander around and, yeah, it's pretty awesome.
I love scenes that are just emotional give and take. By the same token, action sequences are great to do. They have their own unique demands and requirements. So I take it as it comes, and hopefully you can get a good balance of all of that stuff.
I just have a real problem with people who seek to portray fatness or thinness as moral concepts.
College athletics are so entrenched and enjoyed by so many people that they will never be discontinued or substantially changed. I know that. I just pity the people caught in that tender trap. And most of all, I pity those kids.
I'm a writer; it's not just what I do, but who I am.
I don't really know how my family and friends will react to seeing me on screen in a cinema. I'm sure it'll be an odd experience for them, just like I'm sure it will be for me.
