I still get a few dirty looks over the racks in the supermarket, but nobody kicks me in the shins on Water Street. I've made sort of a point, apart from being a social dud, not to fraternize with the people I write about.
There are situations when, in your singing, in your interpretation of songs, for instance, when you want a straight tone. And I have to work really hard at getting a straight tone... That's sort of like if you have curly hair, you have curly hair.
I think the way I sort of approach it is, you just sort of keep your head down and focus on what you are doing and making shows that people will want to see on Thursday night.
All my life, I've been sort of a professional optimist, full of good cheer about matters political and journalistic. I always thought I'd get older and become an unnaturally cheerful old fart. But it's not happening.
Disney had such a hold on the mind of America-they were Adolf Hitler. The whole country thought Disney was some sort of god and that animation was some sort of pure thing for children.
Most Americans aren't the sort of citizens the Founding Fathers expected; they are contented serfs. Far from being active critics of government, they assume that its might makes it right.
Embedded in 'The New York Times' institutional perspective and reporting methodologies are all sorts of quite debatable and subjective political and cultural assumptions about the world. And with some noble exceptions, 'The Times,' by design or otherwise, has long served the interests of the same set of elite and powerful factions.
There's always been something about Jeffrey Tambor, not only as an actor but as a person, where his ability to embody a sort of very dignified feminine way of being just - this was just very clear to me.
There have been days where I've had two writers' rooms or three writers' rooms going, and you walk back and forth. And then you sort of throw yourself on the sofa, and you go, 'Just talk at me for, like, 20 minutes,' and my brain will catch up with this particular story. But I find that exciting.
I'm not really a sequel guy. I did 'Angels & Demons' after 'The Da Vinci Code,' because I like working with Hanks, and I felt it was a really different sort of world that we were visiting. That was, of itself, interesting.
We just sort of thought a Web series would be a cool thing to be able to send to our parents to show them that we were, in fact, actually doing comedy.
I love pressure in a different sort of way; I enjoy the pressure of getting out and performing for the public. Being compared and judged doesn't seem quite right to me.
I mean Gorilla was really our first sort of goes at songwriting.
I write better in Cape Breton... too many people around in Ontario. Down there I meet all sorts of non-human people, but they don't bother me, and I don't feel I have to apologize on behalf of my species quite so often.
My daughters are both funny and smart and lots of fun. They play lacrosse, soccer, musical instruments, like to cook with me, and are naturals in the swimming pool. Honestly, though, what I like doing most with them is eating. I've worked really hard to make sure they are willing to try all sorts of different foods.
I hope that in some way that I can be some sort of beacon of hope, especially because I am not the typical Hollywood beauty.
I've always envied people who compose music or paint, because they don't have to be bothered with the sort of crude mess that language normally is, in everyday life and in the way we use it.
I wanted to stay on a career path of the likes of Natalie Portman. I didn't want to be pigeonholed into a certain genre. I sort of believe that slow and steady wins the race.
I love when stories have something a little magical in them, and there's wonder and curiosity. Somewhere there are people living these improbable stories, and our job is to go out and find them and bring them to the page. And so, the more surprising, the more uplifting, the more sort of even inspiring a story is, I find myself gripped by those.
I think ideas should be flying about and banging into each other. It is a kind of energy. If you occupy static positions, then things sort of ossify.
When I feel like I'm doing my best work, there is a bit of a freedom, a bit of flight that you're not so much losing yourself but you're sort of in the zone.
There are recurring elements in popularized fairy tales, such as absent parents, some sort of struggle, a transformation, and a marriage. If you look at a range of stories, you find many stories about marriage, sexual initiation, abandonment. The plots often revolve around what to me seem to be elemental fears and desires.
For years, Judaism has been a sort of product put on the religious shelf, and on holidays, we would take it off the shelf and let seculars play with it for a bit. Now, Judaism is going back to being something that more closely touches everyone.
I've decided I'm no longer pulling sweaters over my head. Maybe that's sort of an old man thing, but if it is, I'm there.
If Hollywood stars speak out, so do all sorts of other people. Now Hollywood stars can get a better hearing.
This is just rap. I'm not trying to make people think I'm some sort of scientific wizard or inspirational poet.
The French word for wanderlust or wandering is 'errance.' The etymology is the same as 'error.' So to wander is to make mistakes. In other words, to make mistakes, to make errors is sort of the idea of learning through trial and error, allowing the mistakes to be part of the process.
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.
My recollection of the higher school certificate, which involved a practical exam in physics, was being confronted with an experiment involving a sort of barometer arrangement, wondering why I couldn't make it work.
I struggle with the idea of comparing people's work and art. The notion of giving awards or putting a competitive spin on something that is a relative art form is sort of odd to me.
Instead of putting someone in prison for being a hooligan, give him a choice. He may have beaten someone up and he's got eight years, but tell him you can do eight years inside or spend five years in the Army. Put him in the Parachute Regiment, they'd soon sort him out.
It's ironic that the growth of Scottish nationalism has precipitated in the English the sort of hand-wringing the Scots have always done over who they are.
Some people think that horror films are some sort of second class filmmaking, and the only way to bypass that thinking is being proud of the fact that we do it.
It was never really part of my plan to be in films; it was really sort of a dream.
I couldn't speak well. I went to speech therapy for 10 years. And I was sort of frustrated in that sense.
It's true that the original idea was mine, but what you see today is the work of probably tens of thousands of the world's best engineers, all concentrating on improving the product, reducing the cost, things of that sort.
