I believe the war on terror is the vital discussion of this decade and of our generation, probably. To win the war on terror, you need a good offense and a good defense. On defense, I regret to say, basically, this administration has not come close to doing what is necessary.
One of the things I've started doing lately is tracking my dreams. I feel like there's a lot of information there and you can really bring those emotions to the situations that may feel mundane or familiar. That gives them new life and gives you a new relationship with it - if that makes any sort of sense.
The number of people writing poems is vast, and their reasons for doing so are many, that much can be surmised from the stacks of submissions.
Saying and doing are two things.
I don't think I'll be playing again. I'm very content and happy, doing the types of things I haven't gotten to do, be a father.
I don't know what I am doing tomorrow. But I know one thing for sure: the day I stop enjoying my work, I will pack up and leave.
Neil Young is my hero, and such a great example. You know what that guy has been doing for the past 40 years? Making music. That's what that guy does. Sometimes you pay attention, sometimes you don't. Sometimes he hands it to you, sometimes he keeps it to himself. He's a good man with a beautiful family and wonderful life.
Usually when I'm out doing stuff, I'm just out in the wild, doing the wild thing. I don't really get a chance to just chill out until I come here, in my creative space.
It turns out that my memory is just not that great, so for specific scenes with people doing stuff, sometimes I'd have the details all wrong or I couldn't remember what happened exactly, so I just let that be.
We always had our own vegetables growing up and now I'm doing it with my kids at our house in the country.
This is going to sound completely absurd, but I do sometimes feel like the enjoyment of an awards ceremony or the pride in the finished article hasn't ever surpassed the joy of doing the work, of making it. The doing it is really the bit I'm there for.
No matter who I'm talking to, I always talk like I'm doing an interview.
I've been doing everything I can to reach out and understand why people voted against me. They were trying to send a message. I have to be more sensitive in the way I express myself, and I have to be more thoughtful in the positions I take.
For too long, decisions have been taken behind closed doors - tablets of stone have simply been past down to people without bothering to involve people, listen to their views or give them information about what we are doing and why.
I am on my way to Ghana tomorrow morning and you just need to know that this Administration is very focused on doing all we can to promote economic development in this part of the world, in Africa, throughout Africa, North Africa and sub-Saharan Africa.
But I always communicate with the audience. I never pretend like I'm just in my bedroom making a track. The whole point of doing a gig is, like, a feedback thing between you and the audience.
Every time I do one I feel like I've never really quite learned anything. I always find that when I'm making a film, I find it a little bit like I'm doing it for the first time.
I have new music coming out. I'm working on some television shows. I still do a tremendous amount of concerts. I'm doing my restaurant. I got a club coming in New York. The restaurant is called Doug E. The club is called Fresh.
I am blessed to be doing what I do. So if I have to be at a photo shoot, do an interview, or make a TV appearance, I am not going to sit around whining and complaining about how I don't want to get up early or I don't feel like talking.
I wasn't really interested in doing anything except going from pilot season to pilot season and sowing my oats in the months between and telling my agency to stop sending me movie scripts, because they'd pile up in my house and make me feel guilty because I had to read them.
Film scores are often based on short themes, and it helps if you've got some way of developing these themes and making them sometimes last 4 minutes and sometimes last 40 seconds. One ends up doing it subconsciously.
No one was more important than my mom and dad. I know they are watching from a place up in heaven here today to make sure all their kids are doing good.
It is not the crook in modern business that we fear, but the honest man who doesn't know what he is doing.
I think the reason I'm an actor is the joy I find from escaping and going to be somebody else. That's what I have fun doing.
Doing the Muppet Show you forget about conventional filming.
The TV schedule is fantastic. It allows you to have a life. Theater actors are so disciplined - especially if you're doing musicals, you have to be in shape physically, mentally, and have to be on your game all the time. That's exhausting. On TV, especially a sitcom, you have a lot of free time to play.
I'm retiring the Mos Def name after 2011. I'm actually doing it.
If your mother did not know how to love herself, or your father did not know how to love himself, then it would be impossible for them to teach you to love yourself. They were doing the best they could with what they had been taught as children.
Today, we have two Vietnams, side by side, North and South, exchanging and working. We may not agree with all that North Vietnam is doing, but they are living in peace. I would look for a better human rights record for North Vietnam, but they are living side by side.
In terms of intellectual property, so many of the job creators I know are start-ups. In the IP setting, we can meaningfully improve on the status quo, and in so doing, we can help small businesses, large businesses, and those in between.
But often times, I feel like I'm so blessed, it's not fair. That what I'm doing is not contributing to the good of the world.
I love doing a show that makes no mention of ethnicity.
The cool thing about doing a play is that the final interpretation of a piece is turned over to the actors.
I teach class. I study music. I rehearse. I coach people. That's it. I'm doing exactly what I want.
Nobody can be exactly like me. Even I have trouble doing it.
Anytime you make big plans, you have people questioning what you're doing.
