My background is somewhat unusual, as I trained to be a ballet dancer. I worked in the theatre for eight or nine years as a contemporary dancer. But as an actor one does read Shakespeare and does try to learn the classics.
I think we ought to suspend, perhaps, elections for Congress for two years and just tell them we won't hold it against them, whatever decisions they make, to just let them help this country recover. I really hope that someone can agree with me on that.
The first person to promulgate the Golden Rule, which was the bedrock of this empathic spirituality, was Confucius 500 years before Christ.
I was with the CIA for only three years. I worked in the Directorate of Operations, which is now called the National Clandestine Service. It's the part of the organization where the spies live. I didn't have much experience beyond the training.
I've been playing a guitar since I was 10 years old.
I never had any financial support or sponsors, and so I always had to, at every level, prove myself the hard way. I was five years in Japan before I got my debut at Le Mans. And I think this is a humble way to get through as a racing driver.
I had an amazing experience doing 'Skins.' It was the first acting I'd ever done in my entire life, so I had to learn on set for those two years. I had to keep my head screwed on and learn from the other cast.
It started when I was eight years old. I first heard the cello on the radio, and I loved the sound. It was such a magical, beautiful sound. I dedicated my entire childhood to cello, practising like crazy.
I lived in Peckham for the first 12 years of my life and then my mum and dad decided they really didn't want to bring up their children there. So they saved up money and bought a house in Plumstead, semi-detached, three bedrooms.
The thing that was most harmful was that there was always something that was about to happen. So I found myself indulging in the writer's luxury of doing another draft, another idea. If this project isn't happening, then I'll shelve one script and start writing another. And in that way, the years go by, and there's very little money coming in.
Over the last 10-15 years, you've seen soccer finally start to grow at a fast pace, start to get the recognition it deserves, and I think it has to do with all of the people who come to America from foreign countries.
As the years go by and I make more films, I am increasingly interested in capturing place as a vivid backdrop for my films.
I am the granddaughter of a Welsh coal miner who was determined that his kids get out of the mines. My dad got his first job when he was six years old, in a little village in Wales called Nantyffyllon, cleaning bottles at the Colliers Arms.
I hate Alzheimer's. It is one of the most awful things because, here is a loved one, this is the woman or man that you have loved for 20, 30, 40 years, and suddenly, that person is gone. They're gone. They are gone.
I've had a carry permit for 30 years, and I would say off and on in different instances where I have, you know, felt it was appropriate, I would carry the weapon on myself.
I have always respected education, which is why I actually went back secretly and taught school for eight years.
After two years in the songwriting world, I wrote 'All About That Bass.' L.A. Reid heard it and signed me as an artist.
I don't want to be 50 years old and not know what's going on with my kids and my grandkids.
A great deal has been written in recent years about the purported lack of motivation in the children of the Negro ghettos. Little in my experience supports this, yet the phrase has been repeated endlessly, and the blame in almost all cases is placed somewhere outside the classroom.
I think I'm still chewing on my years as a foreign correspondent. I found myself covering catastrophes - war, uprising, famine, refugee crises - and witnessing how people were affected by dire situations. When I find a story from the past, I bring some of those lessons to bear on the narrative.
There I was - 20 years old, living in Ireland, and I'd never heard the word 'venture capitalist.' But I'd said that I wanted a job that involved a lot of negotiation, a lot of yelling at people on the phone, and for it to be high-risk, high-reward.
The best ideas are those that really affect me emotionally - those are the ones you never forget. You think to yourself, 'I want to write that book', for years; those are the ideas that I love to work with, and 'The Bone Garden' was one of them.
I'm 21 years old, and it's kind of uncomfortable for me to talk about, but I'm in the 1 percent as far as my income and tax bracket. But now that I'm here, there's no amount of money you can wave in front of my face that will make me understand depriving people of human rights.
The Chinese were good to us. The war years for us Russians in China were very good years.
I knew Sinatra for 38 years. He was like my father. Frank Sinatra was my 'dad.' He treated me like his son. He gave me the best advice about singing, about this and that... He was a very sensitive man, very astute, one of the sharpest men that I ever met in my life.
I never really thought about being a role model. I started really young, so at 10 years old, I was still very much the person who needed role models. I wasn't really prepared to be one, but it's always something that I've taken very seriously.
When I was 11 years old, my mother bought me one of those chemistry sets, and I stayed with it.
Ever since I was 10 years old doing jiu-jitsu, I've done well against the tall guys.
Twenty years ago, there were dozens and dozens of independent television producers. There are a couple now, at the most. Mark Burnett, Endemol. It's gone. Everybody works for the Man now. And it's natural law, how that happened: Nobody prescribed it, but it's how things worked out and how it has been for decades, period.
Fear of failure held me back from being a DIYer for many years, especially after a few early attempts at home improvement projects went awry.
You don't get better as you get older in your career. It's not natural to have your best years late in your career. So I'm trying to do whatever I can to keep my body feeling good for as long as I can.
I started playing guitar when I was, like, 5, and I picked up playing drums when I was 6 years old.
Franklin D. Roosevelt was fortunate: He didn't take office until nearly four years after the Wall Street crash, by which time the Republicans' responsibility for the Depression was taken for granted.
For the last couple of years, as the economic ground beneath all I've accomplished and cherished has shifted so profoundly in a life-shattering reversal of fortune, I've trained myself to stay alert when the roar and the rumbling of what could be catastrophic change begins.
For years I exercised to be thinner, and I never got the results I wanted. When I finally started working out to be healthier, I saw a transformation. I've even quit weighing myself so I don't obsess over the numbers.
I do all I can to maintain good health. I eat mostly plants, as Michael Pollan would say. I get a lot of exercise. I lead a purposeful daily life. I stay current with the dentist. I made the formative decision of where to live over thirty years ago when I settled in a 'main street' small town in upstate New York.
