I might have been just as happy to have been a practicing primary-care doctor. But as a medical student, I had interacted with patients suffering from neurodegeneration or acute clinical schizophrenia. It left an indelible mark on my memory.
I do strongly identify with being Jewish. I was raised Orthodox and had a childhood complicated by the fact that my father was deeply religious and my mother was not.
Once I had asked God for one or two extra inches in height, but instead, he made me as tall as the sky, so high that I could not measure myself... By giving me this height to reach people, he has also given me great responsibilities.
I had begun reading earlier than most because my sister Emmy Lou, no doubt to keep me from bothering her, decided it was easier to teach me to read stories to myself rather than to read them to me, as she had been doing.
I love coming to Las Vegas. I've always loved it and always had a good time.
I think I'm just like a lot of people who had nothing. We had to amuse ourselves, so we had to become amusing.
To prevent the theft of 'Ben-Hur's sets, guards were prowling the back lot long after production had been shut down.
I love chocolate, and I love ice cream. That's a double whammy there. I constantly have to check myself and say, 'I've already had dessert today.'
I had to accept the fact that sometimes things happen that are out of our hands.
When I was growing up, I, like many Jews, cheered what appeared to be the receding of faith from everyday life. The further religion got from our lives the better our lives would get, I thought, because persecution had been such a burden to Jewish families for generations.
When I graduated from high school, I had artistic and academic scholarships, and I was trying to figure out what to do. I decided to audition for the Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts, Juilliard and the National Institute of Dramatic Arts in Sydney, Australia.
When I got out of the army, I had the G.I. Bill. Since I had no high school education or anything like that, I came to NYU, and they took a chance on me and let me in.
My whole career began because I was always putting my music on the Internet. By the time I had my first tour, I had an audience everywhere I went, because people were listening online.
In high school I had a boyfriend who was super into rap, so I was into Too $hort and Wu-Tang for a little while. And my best friend's older brother would sometimes drive us home in this pimped-out truck, and he'd play all his dirty rap music. We thought we were really cool.
I was born at home in rural Kentucky, in 1942, in a house that my father Howard had built. He did most of the construction himself and built it on land that his father had given him when he married my mother Faye.
Working with Dudley Moore was so hilarious. I don't know how we got anything done because everybody was laughing so hard, but he was such a wonderful man, and he had a kindness and a musicality and a dearness to him that was triumphant.
I landed the role in 'Caddyshack' auditioning, like everybody else. It wasn't a role I thought I'd get, so I had nothing to lose.
I don't spend any time at all thinking about my personal wealth. I suppose if I had nothing, I might think, 'I have nothing.'
I know that Daddy had an important job. He was working to change the world so everyone would love wildlife like he did. He built a hospital to help animals, and he bought lots of land to give animals a safe place to live.
Resilience is accepting your new reality, even if it's less good than the one you had before.
I remember at the age of, and I'll say this, 10 and a half, 11, I had a natural boy soprano.
I had internal bleeding with blood clots on the brain. I was completely blind and deaf. I had a heart attack and a stroke.
Whatever I had to prove in the 'Flash' world about myself as an actor, I proved as Henry Allen.
The team that I had built was all white dudes with the same perspective on things that was at times comfortable and easy, but we weren't as innovative as our competitors.
I would wear the blue overalls of the fieldworker and often wore round, rimless glasses known as Mazzawati teaglasses. I had a car, and I wore a chauffeur's cap with my overalls. The pose of chauffeur was convenient because I could travel under the pretext of driving my master's car.
Having grown up on 'Star Trek,' I've had one great dream since childhood, and that is to see my life end somewhere other than here on Earth.
I had an audition for Mary Jane Watson in 'Spiderman' and ended up playing Betty Brant in that series. I auditioned for Amy Adams' role in 'Catch Me If You Can' and, you know, ended up playing the bank teller. So there were a lot of times early on where I felt like I was always sort of the bridesmaid, never the bride - never quite right.
My father wasn't a hard guy. He was a well-liked guy. He had a lot of compassion about things in life. There were rules, but there was also flexibility within those rules. He didn't push me when it came to golf: he just taught me the right way to play the game.
I was one of the actors in 'Braveheart,' and that had a huge impact on the political scene in Scotland. One of the results of that, in 2014 there's going to be a referendum in Scotland as to whether Scotland is going to be independent. A great deal of that was brought to the nation as a result of 'Braveheart.'
I was raised with the idea of maximum effort: as long as you could look in the mirror and say, 'I gave it everything I had,' it was OK. But if you gave it less, that would disgrace you.
In 'Twice Born' I play my character in her 20s, 30s and 50s. For the fifty year old scenes, I had some prosthetics; it was interesting to see how I'm going to look when I'm fifty-five or so. I actually saw similarities between my grandmothers and my mother.
When I was young, I had this feeling that there was this handbook that I had never gotten that explained how to be, how to laugh, what to wear, how to stand by yourself in the hallway. Everyone looked so natural - like they all practiced and knew exactly what to do - even the way they pushed their hair out of their face.
I don't want to cancel the South out in my life. I carry my Southernness with me. God knows, it's a great place to come from. It's also a place I had to get away from. It is just an endless world for me, so much culture and eccentricity.
William F. Buckley was a man who had a great capacity for fun and for amusing himself by amazing others.
If ESPN ever kicked me out the door and I had to get back to coach, I have to stay on top of what's going on.
If I had a job pitching for the Giants, I probably wouldn't be manning my own Twitter account.
