I had a great AP U.S. History teacher in Pittsburgh. We still exchange Christmas cards. She was the first teacher who said I was a good writer - and I'd never heard that before. And so I remember that, and I remember that level of loving the material and really loving writing about it.
I remember once saying in a television interview that the only things I hadn't been in were the opera and the ballet. Two days later, I got a call from Lord Harewood, of the English National Opera, saying "Would you like to be in 'Ariadne auf Naxos?'"
The oddest things happen to me. It goes in seasons. Nothing will happen for a long time, and I miss it, and I remember how these strange coincidences used to happen to me and how amazing it was, how it made me want to believe in something. A year will go by, and then a slew of them will come along, like buses, one after another.
Pictures are very important. I remember at home we had illustrated editions of Rudyard Kipling's 'Just So Stories' and 'The Jungle Book,' which were read to me. Living in Zimbabwe made it very real, especially the 'Just So Stories' with the 'great grey-green greasy Limpopo.'
I remember that Scott Jacoby was a nice young man.
In the beginning I just wanted to survive. For the first three years, we made zero revenue. I remember many times when I was trying to pay up, the restaurant owner would say, 'Your bill was paid.' And there would be a note saying, 'Mr. Ma, I'm your customer on the Alibaba platform. I made a lot of money, and I know you don't, so I paid the bill.'
The first painting I remember selling was 'Panthera.' I made it while I was in residence at the Studio Museum in Harlem, and the museum actually purchased it directly from me.
I remember saying to the chairman after serving the first year, 'Why are we doing this? Why don't the Hawaiians have control?' 'Well, we have no mechanism to do it,' I was told.
I remember the time I was kidnapped and they sent a piece of my finger to my father. He said he wanted more proof.
I remember the first time I felt that I was sharing the stage with someone spectacular was dancing with Beyonce. It was the dancers, the band, Beyonce and me in front of thousands of people. That was sick. It was pretty amazing that I got to travel the world with someone like her.
But I remember feeling as a producer I felt like the guy who called the caterer and got the band; I had to work the party while everybody else was having a good time.
If I remember correctly, a writer is someone who wants to convey information. Language or writing is a code.
I remember what it was like to be doing 'Lost' and how creatively immersive it was. I just couldn't really engage on anything else, other than 'Lost;' I was just thinking about it all the time, and then there was just the pure workload, the 70- or 80-hour weeks.
I remember going into a bookshop, and the only book I saw with a black child on the cover was 'A Thief in the Village' by James Berry, and I thought, 'Is this still the state of publishing?' Then I thought, 'Either I can whine about it or try to do something about it.'
I remember, as a kid, I'd follow the rooster and the chickens and watch what type of grass they'd eat. And me and my friends would eat that grass, like that was our lunch.
I remember 'The Norfolk Journal and Guide,' which is a black newspaper that still exists, but it was really influential, as you can imagine, in the Forties, Fifties, and Sixties. But all of their archives are online and digitized, and it was a really great resource.
I remember feeling that. I couldn't do, nor did I want to do, the kinds of roles I'd been doing.
I have to slow down for some people. In Louisiana, people didn't have a clue what I was talking about. I remember seeing people glaze over. Seeing the moment where they've just completely lost all... They just wait for me to stop talking and then say, 'Yeah.'
I, at high school, had a very select group of friends. I am still pretty tight with them now. I definitely have a lot more friends than I remember when I go back home!
I remember lying out in my bed and looking at the vast, quiet sky. Right up above my head, there were three stars in a row, and I remember thinking, 'Well, I'll have those three stars all my life, and wherever I am, they will be. They are my stars, and they belong to me.'
I remember debating the finer points of flaky pastry with my chicken-pot-pie-obsessed American dad. I remember the divine mix of Thai food, TV dinners, and hearty, homemade goodness that have shaped this palate of mine to this day. I remember all this, but I still Google my husband's birthday. Thank God he's famous.
I remember going to my school careers advisor and asked about jobs that required scuba divers. It was a phase.
I remember looking out into the sea of phone lights as Chris Martin belted 'Yellow' on the piano and deciding that that was what I wanted to do for the rest of my life.
I had a basketball net that my dad had put up outside. I went out there and dribbled all day long. I wanted to play basketball. Then I'd go baseball, and then I'd go to football. I remember playing football in a plowed field. I grew up going from one thing to the next wanting to play something.
I remember in the spring of 1971, a hundred thousand people converged on the Pentagon in June of 1971. They threw blood; I guess it was goat's blood or something, on the steps to the Pentagon. People were being accused of being murderers and baby killers. You just can't imagine the civic outrage.
My parents spent 16 years hauling my butt to L.A. for audition after audition. I remember always hoping I could help take care of them because they took such good care of me.
What I remember most about high school are the memories I created with my friends.
I remember I was changing to one phone from another and going through my old contact details, and so I was having to delete duplicate numbers to make room, and up came the name of someone who died, and... it felt hard to delete the name.
I remember thinking during those times that I wanted to write in a way where there are no rules.
I was a very religious child - I went to synagogue at least once, sometimes twice, a day. And I remember my religiousness as good - I think religion is good for children, especially educated children, because it allows for imagination, a whole imaginative world apart from the practical world.
I remember those days with Bergman with great nostalgia. We were aware that the films were going to be quite important, and the work felt meaningful.
I remember being taught in school that you would underline things that you liked. I remember just underlining everything as a kid, thinking, 'This has all gotta be important!' I would just underline the whole thing!
I remember in 'Pride and Prejudice' I had to do a scene where I broke down. And before we filmed I spent like three hours imagining my mum's funeral. Actually, she's very much alive, happy and healthy. It was really horrible.
I remember looking at my daughter for the first time and wondering if that's the way my father looked at me. I could cry, because she's everything to me. I feel so blessed to be taught so much by her.
I was 7, and I remember being given a part in a play and thinking, This is exciting.
Although I'm a retired teenager, I remember what it was like to be one. I could have sworn I was riding an emotional roller coaster most of the time. Looking back, I'm actually amazed that I survived. Barely.
