I was a total nerd growing up. I'd rather sit home and read a novel on New Year's Eve and say, 'Wow, I read the whole thing in one night!' That was my idea of a big time.
I had an insanely long commute - New York to D.C. - when I worked at 'National Geographic.' I hate to waste time, so I spent my time by writing about my life on the premise that I might be able to pitch those as short essays to magazines. It wasn't until later that I realized that I was writing a book.
I like to think of it as this new field. Instead of computer science, it's going to be virtual science.
Probably more than anybody else, I loved Nat 'King' Cole as a performer - not only his singing but his piano playing. Whenever he had a new record come out, I'd get it and try to learn how he was playing. And he was one of the nicest people I'd ever met.
If I have to be considered any type of jazz artist, it would be New Orleans jazz because New Orleans jazz never forgot that jazz is dance music and jazz is fun. I'm more influenced by that style of jazz than anything else.
What's the difference in opening from scratch in Philly or opening from scratch in New York? The old out-of-town tryout circuit - taking the show pre-Broadway to cities like Boston, New Haven, Philadelphia, Washington - has sort of been replaced with the amount of workshops we do.
I started out doing theater in New York. I used to go to Shakespeare in the Park a lot.
I use an e-reader when I'm traveling: I love carrying dozens of books on a small lightweight device, and I'm still amazed every time I purchase and immediately start reading a new title without leaving my hotel room - in another country!
I live in New York, so I don't get that many Indian scripts.
I'm writing for my ideal reader, for somebody who's willing to take the time, who's willing to get lost in a new world, who's willing to do their part. But then I have to do my part and give them a sound and a voice that they believe in enough to keep going.
Always trying new things is always more fun, and it can be scary, but it's always more fun in the end.
Saks is one of the temples of good-quality products in America. The Saks shop in New York, for me, is the most interesting department store in America.
A strategy is something like, an innovative new product; globalization, taking your products around the world; be the low-cost producer. A strategy is something you can touch; you can motivate people with; be number one and number two in every business. You can energize people around the message.
As the middle begins to feel safe enough to accept some of the so-called radical thinking, ideas move to the middle and a new edge is created.
We do a lot of outbound work where we're talking about the future. As we get involved with these new products, it helps us have a platform to talk about where the future is going.
I love the simplicity and freedom of running. A pair of shoes, and you are all set to explore new trails.
Cross the wrong state border with your gun, or wake up one morning to new legislation or a new presidential executive order, and suddenly you're the bad guy, not the good guy. No wonder some gun owners seem so touchy; they feel, at some level, like criminals in waiting.
Hollywood's fickle. It's always been that way, and it will always be that way. And it's always going to be somebody new and exciting comes along. That's just the way it works, and it will always work that way. And I think that if you give it everything to the exclusion of your own real life and family, you've sold yourself down the river.
The craziest thing is walking down the streets of New York and people recognizing me and asking for my photo. It has been pretty wild. I am used to getting spotted in ski towns, but I never thought it would happen in a place like this.
What happens in Vegas may stay in Vegas, but what happens in New Orleans, goes home with you.
It's weird because I am accessible to people on Twitter, and I can choose to read good things or mean things, and people can reach out to me directly and tell me how much they hate me or love the song. It's a very strange new paradigm as an artist to find yourself among this kind of connectivity.
Corporate tax reform is nice in theory but tough in practice. It most likely requires lower tax rates and the closing of loopholes, which many companies are sure to fight. And whatever new, lower tax rate is determined, there will probably be another country willing to lower its rate further, creating a sad race to zero.
Government is not being honest with taxpayers when it renews existing tax breaks and calls them new tax cuts.
I'm a classically trained painter, and I was an illustrator in New York working with Fortune 500s companies as well as the NBA and the Olympics. I first got into sculpting when I created a sculpture based on a painting I had done for the 1984 Olympics.
We ended up New Year's Eve playin' a show. My date had stood me up, and I remember walkin' back to my friends with, like, two minutes before midnight and thinkin', 'I'm not gonna have anybody to kiss on New Year's.' And there she was, standin' right there, and I remember kissin' her, and then that was game over.
When I wrote the eight fairy tales that appear in 'Horse, Flower, Bird' I was working toward a completely new form of artistic expression, trying to create a new kind of tale that also felt vintage: innocent and childlike, but haunted. I tried to write a picture-less picture book.
Anything back in New Orleans is definitely nostalgic. I really played my first shows of my life and learned to perform here. I learned how to work a stage and how to connect with a crowd. It all started here.
I don't love it when people come in and say, 'We need a woman on our board,' or 'Can you invest in this new shopping app because you like to shop?' But whatever gets me in the deal.
I forced myself to think what is the new concept and it became clear to me that it was risk, not only in technology and ecology, but in life and employment, too.
There is no situation like the open road, and seeing things completely afresh. I'm used to traveling. It's not a question of meeting or seeing new faces particularly, or hearing new stories, but of looking at life in a different way. It's the curtain coming up on another act.
Key West is the place where your sickly house plant back in New York grows to 10 ft. It's also the place where an 8-ft. cactus, the century plant, produces a huge yellow flower every great once in a while, like a robot proffering a bouquet. After the plant flowers, it dies.
You know, it's kind of a shame in a way but the more seasoned directors a lot of times have more difficult getting a job than first time guys. New kid on the block kind of thing.
New Jersey residents deserve to have their tax dollars spent on transportation and infrastructure projects right here in the Garden State instead of being wasted in Washington.
First, we did rank everybody by risk, and New York comes out number one.
I liked New England.
I love every minute of fatherhood, staying up all night, changing nappies, kids crying, I find it really funny and inspiring. It connects you to the world in a new way.
