I had tried writing novels for many years, and they always escaped me. For a long time, I thought, 'It's just not in me to write a novel. It's not something I'm able to do.' It seemed like everything I wrote naturally ended at the bottom of page three. A picture book, three pages; an essay, three pages.
I was a careless Protestant, my wife was a good Catholic, and we had six kids in seven years and I'd endorse that to everyone.
I have minor characters who are Asian-American, and I've been using them throughout my career, but they've never taken center stage, they've never been really powerful, they've never expressed some of the experiences I had growing up in the U.S. Johnny Tam is the first one.
I pretty much ignored politics all through my 20's and 30's... I had other things on my mind... the band, finding a meaningful relationship, getting enough money to eat and pay the rent.
I've had a few semi-toxic relationships, but it's not what I look for when I'm seeing someone.
When I reached 80, my world turned upside down physically. I've had a lot of physical problems.
I met five presidents. I had dinner with a president of the United States in the White House. I played golf with a president of the United States. I made money. I mean, when I look at it, I had a unbelievably fabulous career. And I'm extremely grateful.
Before I modeled, I never thought I was beautiful. Even right now, I don't think I'm beautiful. I think it's my personality that makes my beauty different and unique. If you look in the past, Chinese people have always considered things like big eyes, pointy nose, or big lips beautiful. I had the same thoughts as a child watching movies.
I always loved the guitar, from when I was quite little. My dad had a G banjo at the house that he played. When he had parties, my sisters always played piano, and my dad played banjo.
General Washington had rather incautiously encamped the bulk of his army on Long Island - a large and plentiful district about two miles from the city of New York.
In 2008, I was in a London park when I came across a fledgling crow that had fallen from the top of an oak tree. A woman happened to be passing, and she said that she rescued animals, so she invited me back to her house. It turned out she was the wife of Jeff Beck. Jeff was there, and we ended up jamming together.
I moved to L.A. to write and direct. I had no intentions of being in front of the camera.
My friend Jonathan had a great tree house. It was awesome. It was like a big fort up in this tall magnolia tree... That's where we would conduct our very important business, I'm sure, with all our bikes leaning up against a tree and no girls allowed, handling all sorts of important things you handle when you're seven or eight.
I carried out my orders until arrested. I had no sense that I was spying, and I ask that this be taken into account in deciding my verdict.
I love traveling. But I haven't had big, transformative experiences while on the road. When I go out on the road, it's to go out and get a story or do a promotional event.
In Torch Song, I did that character almost non-stop from 1978 until I made the movie in 1987. Then I had some failure, which also colors how you react to doing other things.
The press have given me affairs I've never had and killed a few I did have. After a while, you learn.
My No. 1 is Johnny Depp, ever since 'Cry Baby.' He had my heart.
When I was very small, maybe 8 years old, we had a big radio that stood on four legs, and it had a cross piece underneath it, and I used to take a pillow and crawl under the radio.
I've decided 'Breaking Bad' may be one of the best TV shows ever, but I had to watch every last episode of the first four seasons to come to that conclusion.
I had no luck when I started out as a model. I keep telling people that it's the only career in the world that you can't choose for yourself - you have to be chosen.
Oh, those golden-yellow eyes of the wolf! You can feel yourself being pulled in. I knew I had been accepted - and that I had spoken to another species.
Mobile communications had been around for a long time, but always as a limited market, constrained by the radio spectrum.
I didn't know a thing about Oxford and had never been to Britain. My father suggested it because in 1939 he had been about to take up a place at Wadham College, but the war broke out, and he joined the Army instead.
My dad's songs were really written to make certain people feel as though they had some kind of value. Because they were told from where they work and from the countries they had immigrated from that they did not.
The new millennium began with a great global dream. World leaders gathered at the United Nations in 2000 and adopted, among others, a historic goal to reduce poverty by half by 2015. Never in human history had such a bold goal been adopted by the entire world in one voice, one that specified time and size.
The last thing that scared me... it was probably something stupid, like when someone jumped out at me, or I thought my new dog had gone to the toilet underneath my piano. Lots of silly things.
At an event in Germany, I realised the organisers had 'The Great Escape' playing as background music to my test, and I just thought, 'It's really cool. I want that.' It is fantastic to ride to.
I never had a boss in my whole life. I've totally destroyed anybody's ability to tell me what to do.
I was lucky that I started very young, since I had a very clear idea of what I wanted to do. But my father is very conservative, and he never considered fashion to be a real career but something I could pursue as a hobby. He wanted me to be a doctor, and at one point, I thought of becoming a plastic surgeon.
I have used dating apps a couple of times in the past and met people, but it is a difficult thing because you're meeting someone who you really don't know and you have no link to. I have friends who have had great relationships after meeting on Tinder or Bumble, so I'd never say never, but it hasn't worked for me.
My father would go shopping, and he was supposed to buy loo roll or something, but he'd always come back with some fish or shellfish. And we've always had fresh vegetables from the garden. He is a massively keen gardener, so he grew all our tomatoes, artichokes, asparagus - whenever he wasn't working, he was in the garden.
I think it's also safe to say genre TV and movies were a big influence - the first stories I ever tried to write were Godzilla fan fiction when I was in elementary school, complete with elaborate maps of Monster Island made with multiple sheets of typing paper and nearly six feet wide. I kind of wish I still had those.
I'm into books - I love literature, so I toyed with the idea of being an English teacher. I had a fantastic English teacher at school. I think great English teachers make the world go round.
If you had asked me when I was in Yale, I would tell you I never would have thought it would happen because I just didn't think of myself of having the Hollywood look.
'Tempting the Best Man' centers around Madison Daniels, who's had a major crush on her brother's best friend since she was a girl.
