My mum sent me to an open audition for 'Notes On A Scandal' so I could see quite how many other girls wanted to do this. And I queued up, and I got the job. That was my first-ever audition, and my second was 'Atonement.'
I just started the way most comics start, doing open mic shows around Sacramento and San Francisco, and eventually, I moved to L.A. After about four or five years in L.A., I got the call to join the 'The Daily Show.'
I got kids that are growing up in a Donald Trump world because we screwed up because we haven't been able to craft a message and push policies that connect with working class people.
The mentality in Washington is, 'Look what our government - what our government can do for the American people.' We've got to get away from that mentality, and realize it's too expensive. We can't afford it.
I started on television. I had five years of network television before I ever got up on a stage. The first thing I ever did was in 1967. This guy Bill Keene had a little talk show at noon, and Gary Owens took over for a week. He knew about this dummy bit I used to do, this ventriloquist thing, and I was on 'Keene at Noon.'
I'm part of a great job where I get paid to learn. My first brush with the world of showbiz happened when I got selected while I auditioned for 'Dhoom Machao Dhoom' at my college in Delhi.
I got all my boyhood in vanilla winter waves around the kitchen stove.
I was once again looking for a book idea, and I remembered Holmes, but I specifically remembered that there was this World's Fair thing in the background. I thought, 'I'll read about the fair.' I had nothing better to do. I'd dismissed about a dozen ideas, and I was getting sort of antsy. I started reading, and that's where I got hooked.
I'd dropped out of high school without really doing it on purpose - I'd just go home at lunch 'cos I didn't have friends, then stay there all afternoon listening to rap. It got to the point where I wouldn't have passed even if I'd gone back. I was depressed, basically.
These guys who keep on playing but aren't winning, you've got to sit them down and let them figure it out and perform a little gut-check on themselves.
It would probably be better if I got involved in fewer things just because I'd have more time to write for my own purposes... But if somebody calls you up with a really cool project, it's hard to just say 'no' because you don't feel like working.
I turned 40, got married, got a kid, and my mother passed away. I experienced life and death, with the enjoyment of creating life and the loss, within one year.
It wasn't until I got out of the Army and I heard Coltrane's record 'Coltrane,' when he was doing 'Inch Worm' and 'Out of This World,' that I thought, 'Oh my God, you can do that?' And then I thought, 'OK, I better go back and listen to Eric Dolphy a bit.' And then I said, 'Hmm, I better pull out these Ornette Coleman records.'
My dad had a stroke. It's one of those life-changing events. It was right around the time I was turning 40. We were doing 'L.A. Law,' and I got this call that my dad was in Rome and had had a stroke. I want to stress that it wasn't a huge stroke, but it was enough to provide a serious wake-up call.
For British cinema to survive, you really need a British film culture, and it's got to start down there, with young kids watching films in the cinema - so they can be transported to a different world.
I got a little bit lost in the writing process: like, that moment in the 'Fight Song' music video where I'm throwing the crumpled paper on the bed, that was really true life. I was filling journals with different possibilities of lyrics for the first verse. And none of them felt right.
If we can't have comedy books written about aspects of womanhood without going into a panic attack about it, then we haven't got very far at being equal.
Obviously, I'm not working out the way I was when I was playing. I do yoga. I swim a lot. I'm drinking a lot of good, healthy mixes. I got myself a Vitamix.
Work hard. I got tenure a year early. Junior faculty members used to say to me: 'Wow, what's your secret?' I said: 'It's pretty simple. Call me any Friday night in my office at 10 o'clock, and I'll tell you.'
When I was a kid and I'd be in trouble. I'd ask God to help me, and then once the fire was out, I wouldn't talk to Him anymore. When I got older, I began to find I needed some help spiritually, just to function.
'American Idol' was just really a platform. What you do after that is what separates you from the show. And I've been working really hard, touring constantly, and building those fans. You've got to work hard.
When I first got signed, I bought a vintage guitar from the 1930s for £1000. I've bought a £400 SLR camera, too, which was quite extravagant.
I have a real problem now when I go onto Netflix: it takes me a half hour to pick something out. They've got to figure something out, whether it's their algorithm... Maybe if they had it curated like a video store: 'Will Ferrell recommends this movie' or 'Jennifer Lawrence recommends these 10 movies.'
In 2008, I was one of millions united for hope and change. As 2010 dawns, change looks to me like more of the same. Instead of peace, we got more war. Instead of health care reform, we have an industry win that requires Americans to buy health insurance without any real cost controls.
We've got fuel prices coming down and good travel numbers coming out, so it's not surprising airline stocks are going up.
I was fortunate that I was an only child. I had two parents who I really cared about, and they cared about me, so I got off to a good start.
Anything looks good if you've got the body of a Victoria's Secret model and the porelessly smooth skin-tone of a piece of glass.
I've got quite an old-fashioned figure. Back in the Sixties, girls had boobs, a tummy and wide hips, and bigger thighs as well. I think that's sexy - to me, that's what a woman looks like. I've got love handles - sometimes they're passion handles! I'm built for comfort, not for speed, and I like that about myself.
My whole interest in food grew from my interest in gardens and the question of how we engage with the natural world. To go back even further, I got interested in gardens because I was interested in nature and wilderness and Thoreau and Emerson.
We grew up very poor, and I hated being poor. I was the oldest of five kids, and I never got a pair of skates until I was nine. It was very difficult to get an education back then and play junior hockey.
When I got to the senior national team, there was another Ronaldo, so they started calling me Ronaldinho because I was younger.
Life is a big craps game. I've got to tell you, it's all been fun.
I got an old school coach who's more of a teacher than a coach.
Community colleges need to be upgraded. We got to have training for real jobs. We've got a lot of jobs that are going unfilled because we don't have the technology in the heads of graduating college students to deal with them.
Egypt's problem is that you've got an economy that works for about 40 million people, only you have 90 million people. The answer to the Egyptian problem is not guns, but jobs. We've got to find a private-sector, nongovernmental, aggressive way of creating jobs. That's not America's role totally.
People say you've got to be OK with your own company, but tell me why?
