I came to think that nobody from England could draw American comic books, because they were clearly all done by this sort of Mafia, all these guys with Italian and Irish names who had the whole thing sewn up. It was actually seeing a comic book drawn by Barry Smith, who was about my age, and English.
There were so many lessons I learned the hard way: missing out on a raise because I didn't know to ask, having colleagues consistently get credit for my ideas because of how I spoke up in meetings. When I looked for a resource that addressed the challenges I was facing, I couldn't find it. There was nothing.
Ronald Reagan succeeded in bringing down the Iron Curtain by showing strength and resolutely standing up to the Soviet Union. President Trump needs to be similarly resolute towards Putin.
When you see the audiences and the smiling faces at the shows it really makes up for the work that you put in. I have a job I really love so whatever hecticness comes up - I'll just deal with it.
A lot of people out there pay good lip service to the idea of personal freedom... right up to the point that someone tries to do something that they don't personally approve of.
I was journaling in Florence, and I was like, 'Oh, I have to come out of the closet. I have to break up with this guy' - he was my 'roommate.' So that was my awakening moment, when I stepped into my own skin while in a foreign country by myself and had a very stereotypical moment of revelation.
Once you learn how to free up in front of the camera, it's like nothing else.
We all go through sad times, but I was brought up to be positive.
A good night's sleep is always the best way to wake up and go to work.
Women and children were slaughtered by the Taliban. You are going to sit down and negotiate with these folks? They never lived up to an agreement. The Pakistanis tried in '08, the Russians tried it when they were there. George Bush tried it in '05. It has never worked.
I don't wake up saying, 'Oh, I'm going to die.' It's a waste of time. It really is.
I get a lot that people have a hard time believing that I'm a nerd... but I grew up with a Nintendo controller in my hand.
When I hear somebody like Hayes Carll write a song that's touching and poignant and sad and funny all at the same time, it motivates me to step my game up and try to figure out a way to get more different emotions into one line or one song.
I don't usually watch a lot of TV, but 'Mad Men' changed my perspective. I admire Matthew Weiner who came up with the idea and wrote such a great TV series, and the broadcasting company for being bold enough to air such a series.
I was really into old musicals. When I was seven or eight, my mum and dad would be like, 'How does she know who Ginger Rogers is?' Then, one weekend, Josephine Baker popped up in a French film called 'Zouzou,' and I was so stunned because she looked like me.
At the very end of a book I can manage to work for longer stretches, but mostly, making stuff up for three hours, that's enough. I can't do any more. At the end of the day I might tinker with my morning's work and maybe write some again. But I think three hours is fine.
Whatever you hold onto that you want to do, and that other people tell you you are foolish to want to do - don't give up.
When you're doing a film, you're on a set and you have retakes and you have time to get it right. And on 'SNL' it's just go, go, go. If you can't read the cue cards or miss your mark, you're just left to sort of screw up. So there's a lot more pressure doing a live TV show.
I don't know, but I always loved that image of a girl putting toenail polish on a guy - her boyfriend, or something like that. Or a guy waking up in the morning and reaching over and putting on his girlfriend's shirt. Like Keith Richards putting on one of Anita Pallenberg's blouses, or Courtney Love putting nail polish on Kurt Cobain.
I knew I'd end up in show business in some capacity, eventually.
I think the 1970s will always be the decade for me. Obviously, I grew up in that era, but the beauty standard was touchable, kissable.
I like the energy of doing things fast. We shot 'Starred Up' in just four weeks, and we edited it in four weeks.
To grow up knowing you're loved is astounding. It's a huge gift to a child.
It'll be the Internet and piracy that will kill film. There's a philosophy that the Internet should be free, but the reality is that piracy will destroy the film industry and film as an art form because it's expensive to make a movie. Maybe you'll have funky little independent movies, and it'll go back and then start up again some other way.
Maybe it was because my resignation letter was well written, and this attracted the attention of the factory supervisor. They kept me on and gave me a promotion to head up my own newly created department.
I grew up on Jane Austen novels and was a massive literature fanatic when I was a kid - I read everything I could get my hands on.
I grew up under demanding people, that demanded things from you, expected you to toe the mark.
What's interesting is that you can have a set that's very calm, very smooth, very cooperative... and end up with a terrible movie. And you can have a set that's really horrible as far as relationships and volatility, and come up with a great movie. Sometimes that energy gets infused into what ends up on film - it's interesting in that way.
I've been grinding at music for over a decade now. Since I was 18, I decided that this is what I wanted to do. It's not an easy thing. When you start getting 25, 26, people are like, 'Oh you're a musician huh? That's what you're gonna do? When are you going to get a real job?' I never gave up.
For solace, I love a book that opens up my perspective.
I think half of what a trainer does is make you feel shame if you don't show up.
Let me explain something about guitar playing. Everyone's got their own character, and that's the thing that's amazed me about guitar playing since the day I first picked it up. Everyone's approach to what can come out of six strings is different from another person, but it's all valid.
Every day, I wake up and say, 'Good Morning, Jesus.'
Biofuels such as ethanol require enormous amounts of cropland and end up displacing either food crops or natural wilderness, neither of which is good.
I used to visit kids with cancer all the time. Now I'm in the club. I understand what's happening to these little kids with brain cancer, and I ask myself, 'How do they make it through the day?' So you see a little 5-year-old and you say, 'If she can do it, I can suck it up.'
I didn't actually grow up in London.
