I started training with school friends and, one by one, they all dropped out. When we became teenagers, it seemed more exciting to go shopping at weekends. My mum told me not to worry about what my friends were doing and to stick at it.
I'll be honest with you: before I heard Nicki rapping, I probably wouldn't have thought to rap myself. Just to see a female doing it and being in there with the guys, it was motivation.
I was never very good at picking cotton, and then I only made fifty cents or $1 a day. People would work for $1 a day during the Depression. So we would get $2 for playing music and just having fun. I think that as a result of that it was not just the money, but we enjoyed doing it.
The thing is, my fantasies about being a parent always involved fighting for my unpopular child, doing for her what my own parents couldn't do for me when I was a girl. I am so ready to be that little girl's mother.
One of the big takeaways from Iraq was that you have to not lose confidence in what you are doing. We were able to go to the edge of the abyss without losing hope.
I am surprised by how not-adopted the video reply has been. What keeps other people from doing it, I think, is that they think a video comes across as 'I'm cool, look at how many e-mails I get.' That perception doesn't scare me, because I know who I am.
Doing 'Hedwig' was so hard that I kind of burned out on acting.
Success is always something completely different to people. I feel like I've succeeded, if I'm doing something that makes me happy and I'm not lying to anybody.
Doing less films is sometimes intentional, but sometimes things just don't work out.
It's been pretty effortless with Sensa because I am not thinking about how long do I need to do this. Usually, when you stop a diet program, you lose control again. But I don't need to stop what I'm doing. I'm eating everything that I like. Sensa just helps me keep it all in check.
I'm always doing everything backwards.
If we all think only of our own interests, we are headed for collective disaster - just look at what we are doing to our planet's climate.
I've always wanted to be a manga-ka, so I'm doing what I love.
I actually am a capitalist, and I believe in shareholders. But I believe in them as a result of what I do, not as a reason for what I'm doing. The same with profits - profits alone cannot be an objective. It has to have a purpose.
I love conversation and the sharing of different thoughts and philosophies. That kind of stuff always makes me happy. I don't mind interviews, either - I like doing them.
I was 12 when I turned my back on my goal. And I will keep doing it as long as my legs, my head, and my heart will allow.
I had never heard anyone doing what my show does, which is put the focus on the human condition - whatever you're going through, good or bad, right or wrong, straight or gay, whatever. That human experience is the meat of the show.
My entire life, I've always known that I wanted to be a performer, but I didn't know exactly how, where or when. I never learned or studied the craft, formally. I grew up doing martial arts and playing piano. But, something inside of me always said that I was going to do this, as far back as I can remember.
I don't believe that if you do good, good things will happen. Everything is completely accidental and random. Sometimes bad things happen to very good people and sometimes good things happen to bad people. But at least if you try to do good things, then you're spending your time doing something worthwhile.
The first sign that I'd been unknowingly affected by cooking shows occurred on a Sunday morning when I realized I was talking to myself. I'd been making toast. 'First, we cut our bread,' I whispered. 'Do you know why?' I stopped what I was doing and looked up. 'Let me tell you why.'
You're always trying to do something that, on one hand, honors all those stories, that is still in some way the same character that Stan Lee and Jack Kirby were doing back in the sixties. But, at the same time, you want to be able to tell new stories and not just rehash what's come before.
When we worked on 'Girls,' we've had some really meaningful dialogue with our fans and with critics and really learned a lot of things. Like, on the question of diversity, we heard people, and we responded, which is very different from, like, 'Hey fatty, what are you doing on TV?' And that's what we're trying to avoid.
I have to feel the audience. I enjoy that feeling of community. There's something sort of spiritual about it in a lot of ways. It's like we're all doing this together.
I think the reason I don't read is because, when I'm reading, I feel like I'm missing out on something else. You know, What are my friends doing? Where's my girlfriend?
I never pushed the envelope of wanting people to know me, or be on the covers of magazines. I just want to enjoy what I'm doing.
I believe that the right thing for us to do, as much as we can and without confusing people, is to talk about how we're doing, the things that are going well but also the things that aren't going well.
Every time I want to impress someone about samples and hip-hop, I play 'Portrait of Tracy.' It's one of the greatest bass players ever doing a whole composition with only the two harmonics of electric bass; then a three-second loop in it became every great R&B song in five-year intervals.
Back in the day, the album was king in many ways. And, of course, we were very tied in with the birth of FM/college radio in the States, and what we were doing suited the format of those young radio stations.
If you're a woman doing classic theater, the big roles are often destroyers. I've played Hedda Gabler, Lady Macbeth, some of the Chekhovian heroines, Electra, Phaedra - they're all powerful women, but they're forces of negativity.
When I started out, I had no idea what I was doing. I was 16, and acting was a new, exciting thing. So, I took it on. It was an excuse to get away from college.
I have never seen Jeff Bezos, Marc Benioff, or Reed Hastings complain about being public. Nor have they ever argued that being public prevented them from doing things with a long-term focus.
I do own a unicycle, which I use for workout purposes as opposed to doing tricks.
I never breathe through the nose, not when I'm singing. In the opera, you don't have so much time. That's fine at the beginning of an opera or after somebody else has been doing an aria, and you want to get a good fresh start.
I'm not going to be doing anything to hurt myself or my fans.
I have always been interested in gender politics, so I'm not that keen on doing things that don't represent a truth about women.
Eight years ago, you may remember Hillary and I were rivals for the Democratic nomination. We battled for a year and a half. Let me tell you, it was tough, because Hillary was tough. I was worn out. She was doing everything I was doing, but just like Ginger Rogers, it was backwards in heels.
