Holland was one of the first countries to adopt dance music into their culture, and we were the first ones to have really big raves. I grew up in that atmosphere in the early 1990s, and I was very interested in how dance music was made.
Craig McDean was probably one of the first people I shot with. I shot with him for years with Tommy Hilfiger and a few other jobs. He's just so nice and just a super normal, funny guy.
To be one of the first British females to get three gold medals, to join Laura Trott in doing that, is a huge privilege.
When I first saw Drake, I thought I was never going to like him based on the person that I saw on T.V. He's just so full on, and he's got the ladies' man thing, which isn't necessarily something that would resonate with me.
My first wife was a theater person.
'Donnie Darko' was my first audition ever! It opened my eyes to the possibilities within camera work.
It's very easy to say that men think about things more simply, but it kind of is true. And that's not actually a bad thing. Approaching things in a more logical, practical fashion. This is a massive generalisation, but women tend to think about things more first, then act afterwards.
I remember the defining moment when I first realised I was famous. I was in Africa staying in the little tent city there by the Masai Mara River. Two guys with spears looked at me and said, 'Frasier?'
When the history books are written in a thousand years, when space travel would have become routine, the moment that humans first left Earth will be of huge importance. Star City is a central part of this story and it deserves more recognition.
When I first started making music, I was all about wordplay and how fast I could rap, but over the years, I've really gained an appreciation for melody. What's cool is that when you're singing, you have to be concise, and when you're rapping, you have the opportunity to be really detailed with your lyrics.
I'm certainly not a practicing Jew. I would never claim, 'I'm Jewish.' That's not the first and foremost thing in my mind, as far as who I am as a person.
My dad's American, and my mom's French. I lived in France for the first 18 years of my life, then came here to go to school at the College of William and Mary. I studied marketing. I really didn't know what I wanted to do, so I thought that's what I should do - study business - because it would give me the best chance to find work.
Tinguely wasn't the first artist to work with machines. But others were more interested in precision, in what machines are meant to do. What made him different was the random element. He introduced the mechanical accident. He was always interested in the immaterial, in sound, smoke, speed, light, shadows.
Since we launched the original 'Pop Idol' in England, I've remained close with Simon Fuller. Working as executive producer on 'American idol' for its first seven years not only was an inspirational journey into the heart of American pop culture, it opened my eyes to the untapped potential of the incredibly dynamic young people in this world.
When I was growing up, I was really into 'Rent' and I actually slept on the street in New York all night to get to sit in the first few rows for it.
Cuba came to be the last country to get rid of Spanish colonialism and the first to shake off the heinous imperialist tutelage.
When news of the first plane's hitting the World Trade Center reached them, bin Laden's followers exploded with joy. But shrewder members of al-Qaeda and the Taliban leadership in Afghanistan realized that the attacks might not be the stunning victory that bin Laden, and many in the West, took them to be.
When I first read 'Lord of the Rings,' I wanted to see a film of it. But at that time, the technology wasn't there; there was no such thing as CGI.
I like festivals of all kinds: in 1969, I made a film about the first Pan-African festival in Algiers, which celebrated the countries that had been liberated 10 years earlier. There was a tremendous feeling of kinship.
I started dealing with weapons on the first show I ever did, 'The Inside,' but I didn't really do any physical stuff until 'Alias.'
'Rolling Stone,' my first single, was only a hit in Portugal, but when we recorded my second single, 'Can The Can,' I got that hair-on-the-back-of-the-neck feeling, and I knew it would be huge. It topped the charts in the U.K. and Australia in 1973, and I got my first gold disc.
This is going to sound pretentious and esoteric, but I truly mean it from the bottom of my heart. Acting has always been a spiritual journey for me. The very first project I ever acted on paralleled my experience so perfectly even before I was aware of it.
I don't know what to expect out of my films. My first two films were with extremely talented directors, and they didn't work. And my next two films were with newcomers, and they worked well. So I've stopped expecting anything from my movies.
Your first obligation, I suppose, is to your God. Your second is to your family. And your third is to your community. And you ought to try to fulfill all of those in your life.
If I could go back to my first year of acting school, I'd probably say: 'Relax. Stop taking yourself so seriously.'
The first thing I look forward to when I am in Delhi is to spend some time with my family. It's always lovely coming back here and playing in front of my own people. It's just a special place.
When I first started editing a 'Year's Best' volume in the '70s, the job was pretty straightforward - there were three or four monthly magazines to read and a few original anthologies from trade publishers every year.
The first step into justice begins with the politicians. You have to demand from yourself what you demand from people.
In hindsight, Watergate was a curse as well as a blessing for American journalism. The courageous reporting of the 'Post' and the 'New York Times' - coupled with the favourable Supreme Court rulings on publication of the Pentagon Papers - were landmarks for the interpretation of First Amendment rights and the freedom of the press.
I was in the Oval Office when Neil Armstrong landed on the moon because I was called in to coordinate the coverage. I got to thinking, 'We have a feed from the moon. We've got a feed from the Earth. I can set up the first interplanetary shot in history.'
The first song I learned on the guitar was a Kenny Chesney song called 'What I Need to Do'; it was just an easy song to play... and it was really cool to see that come full-circle a few years later and have him record a song that I was part of.
But when I was twelve years old I caught my first strong glimpse of one of the fundamental forces of existence, whose votary I was destined to be for life - namely, Beauty.
Aim to write for an hour per day. I used to be a teacher, and an hour a day before school was all it took for me to write my first book. Don't get discouraged if a holiday or illness interrupts your writing habit. Just start it up again.
Journalism doesn't have to be your first love... or your only love. You can come to it in desperation, because you can't think of anything better to do with your life, that it's this or the abyss. But once you get going... it helps if you love it.
You always hear actors say, 'Theater is my first love,' and it is. It's a time when you really get to do what you do, and there's not a lot of waiting around and interruption and not a lot of money involved - sometimes money really clouds the waters of creativity.
A lot people ask me, 'How do I become a voice actor?' and, well, first of all, drop the 'voice' because you don't know what mechanics you'll have to employ. If you can just focus on the acting, then the rest will come.
