We live in an age where quantity is seen as preferable to quality, and many people tend to work in a horizontal line: next, next, next. But if you do that, you never investigate the vertical line - the depth of the piece.

I took the role because it's rare to read a script that makes me laugh and cry, and it spoke to my own religious feelings, as well as giving me a chance to draw on my experience as a parent. Accepting it was a no-brainer.

Basically, at some point, one day maybe you can expect to hear some of my music. I haven't really done that yet because my younger brother is a musician and really talented and I want him to come out with his music first.

[ This Is Us] is a character-driven dramedy, in which you will laugh. You may have to pull out your tissue box from time-to-time. But it will sort of reaffirm your desire to move forward in life. It's a very hopeful show.

To me, most theatre looks ridiculous. I find it very difficult to do. Personally, if I ever try to do serious stuff, I always end up looking like an asshole, so I might as well try and do comedy, because I'm good at that.

When you see a crowd of people jumping up and down at a pop concert, all gloriously in the moment, I don't think you'll ever see a comedian there. They'll all be standing at the sides, looking at how it all fits together.

A friend of mine once asked how to make it in show business and I said "Be so good that they can't ignore you." She thought I was being flip but it's true. The challenge is trying to live up to the opportunities given me.

So I dipped into my childhood and came up with Nicky Deuce. I wanted him to get into a lot of mischief, like the time I taped a fork to a broom handle and cattle-rustled a steak off the barbecue of the next-door neighbor.

Transgender casting is a kind of literalism. It is the same with racial casting. This means that you can now only play Othello if you are black. There is something quite tainted about it. It is a form of racism in itself.

I've gone from being a brilliant captain of a TV soccer team to an average rugby player on a real team. I've gotten so used to ruling the roost and just saying whatever the hell I wanted, and I had to get back to reality.

You always draw on your experiences with live audiences to know how to do comedy on films. You're working for a laugh that may or may not come six months later, but you're working in a vacuum at the time you are doing it.

I never thought I would write the way that I write for the studios now, which is like, not little novels, but be someone who literally is more like, you know, sometimes I guess we describe, we're more Salieri than Mozart.

When the media defines something, you have to question: Is it the definition that you want applied to your culture? I'm trying to determine who's leaving the legacy, and if the legacy that is being left is a positive one.

There is less pressure as a character actor. It generally means that you will be acting for all of your life, which is my intention. It is not my intention to just be a rich and famous person, that would be pretty boring.

When I was doing 'Ordinary People' and 'Taps,' I never wondered if it would have a lasting impression. I was just wanting to make the best film we could and do my part in that and be true to what my responsibilities were.

I've had lots of parts in movies that I've never seen. I mean no disrespect to them. It was really fun to go act, but I'm not calling my friends and saying, 'I couldn't be more proud of this picture. You should go see it.

I'm not Waylon Jennings, but I do a fair imitation of him, and a few other country greats, like Willie Nelson. It would be great to sink my teeth into a project where I could play a country singer. I'm like an old cowboy.

n our increasingly secular society, with so many disparate gods and different faiths, superhero films present a unique canvas upon which our shared hopes, dreams and apocalyptic nightmares can be projected and played out.

My dad was a meat peddler who drove a refrigerated truck. He bought his meat in Sheboygan, Wis., and sold it to stores in the region. He was a terrific salesman. People loved and trusted him, and he never let anyone down.

It is important to keep protesting, to keep forcing a conversation in the public arena. In any case, when you know what the right thing to do is, or that something must be said, it can be immoral and dangerous not to act.

I'm just looking as always for something that's stimulating and I hope to find a good story that's a challenge, whether it's big or small. Or that it finds me. I don't have like a career plan. Maybe I should, but I don't.

When you're a child, you're able to assimilate so easily into any situation. You even start talking like the people you're around. I wasn't conscious that I was so good at that until I started to truly feel like an actor.

I met [Shatner] on the set of Star Trek V, and he was horrible to me. He was cruel, and dismissive, and treated me the way I understand he treats pretty much everyone who tells him how much they loved him as Captain Kirk.

I raise quarter horses. Mine are mostly thoroughbred cross horses, a little bigger horses than some people like. I sell them or use them on the ranch. A lot of them go to the rodeo arena and some of them go to racetracks.

There is no pain worse than not achieving a dream when it is your fault. If God did not want you to have it, that is one thing. But if you do not get what you desire because you are lazy, there is no pain worse than that.

The best thing for an actor to do is take your attention off of how you feel about it, and put it on striving to obtain a particular objective. The happy result is that it brings out all this unexpected stuff in yourself.

My friends have stood by me marvelously in the ups and downs of my career. I don't believe there is anything more worthwhile in life than friendship. Friendship is a far better thing than love, as it is commonly accepted.

With 'Rampart,' I read it and I'm like, 'That's the best role I've ever been offered. Phenomenal.' But, I was daunted, you know? Like the concept of trying to be a cop. It's just bizarre, man. Bizarre to even think about.

You always have to remember that bullies want to bring you down because you have something that they admire. Also, when you get made fun of-when people point out your weaknesses, it's an opportunity for you to rise above.

It's weird, but I don't feel like think I deserve any of the attention. There's really nothing but one audition for a Disney Channel movie that separates me from 2,000 other brown-haired, blue-eyed guys in L.A., you know?

I get enough of that on the news, so I didn't want to deal with fundamentalists or any sort of thing like that. I just wanted to keep it as lighthearted as the Cold War was, which obviously it was a fun time for everybody.

I don't know who I touch and who I don't. I work hard trying to make people laugh. I try to do the kind of stuff that made me laugh growing up. I don't have any secrets. I don't know the reasons I've been so well received.

I choose to ignore hell in my life. When I was a little kid I asked my Dad "Am I going to go to hell?" because I'd heard about hell. And he said, "Nothing you're gonna do will get you into hell." And so I got to ignore it.

I usually can find a way to do a character to make it real and work. But sometimes it's a struggle sustaining that, because there's such a level of personal involvement and personal, physical, and emotional distraughtness.

I don't have any set things that I'm looking for, like, 'I've done this now I want to do this,' kind of thing. Just read the material, if it appeals, if it makes me laugh: like, 'Death at a Funeral' made me laugh out loud.

There's something different about an indie film than a TV show that has a huge infrastructure that's in place already for you - at least financially and in terms of distribution. Whereas an indie film is just a total dare.

One day, a musician asked me what I did. When I told him I was to be a businessman, he laughed and said, You are not a businessman. Sometimes all it takes is one person to put an important thought in your head, and he did.

The idea that we cause harm by doing what we perceive to be the right thing, that's another theme that interests me. Because most people don't intend to cause harm, they cause harm by doing the right thing - in their mind.

I sang 'A Closer Walk with Thee' along with blues singer Brownie McGhee, ... Then there was a show where Carol Houston, an actress on 'Matlock' sang 'It Is Well With My Soul' accompanied by a choir. Boy, that was powerful.

I sleep till one, and I'm always surprised when someone in blue rinse on a talk show says, 'You're a genius, Mr. Newley, you do so many things.' Tony Newley never realized his potential, did the things he should have done.

After 'Punk'd,' my company Katalyst did a deal with AOL to produce short-form content for the Web. At that time it was a different game. If you got front-page coverage on any popular website, you could probably get a push.

Things come up in life and we don't feel like we can ever live through them, but if we're still alive afterwards, we get through it. It's that thing where what doesn't kill you makes you stronger. I think that's beautiful.

But when I felt like I had something to prove? Then I got up early every morning and worked all day long. I didn't know if I had any more talent than anyone else directing, but I knew I could work hard at it, and so I did.

I have always been very diversified, so I have never suffered a catastrophic loss. I spread my money around the way a large institutional investor does. I use different brokerage firms. I manage some of my accounts myself.

I've never liked the idea of just having an office in a college somewhere and teaching classes and going to the library and doing research all day. I've never wanted that. The glamorous life is the life that appeals to me.

In high school, all my friends' older brothers had these cars. I had a number of friends whose brothers collected Dodges and Plymouths and some of the coolest cars I've ever seen when I was a kid. I was just flabbergasted.

I try to be available for life to happen to me. We're in this life, and if you're not available, the sort of ordinary time goes past and you didn’t live it. But if you're available, life gets huge. You're really living it.

When I feel like I'm stuck, I do something - not like I'm Mother Teresa or anything, but there's someone that's forgotten about in your life, all the time. Someone that could use an 'Attaboy' or a 'How you doin' out there.

If anything, I've seen myself as the full spectrum of colors, and to be faced with not being able to do something just because I'm of a particular race has been something that I've always found very difficult - even today.

How many stories have you read that aren't true, stories about me and Angie being married or fighting or splitting up? And when we don't split up, there's a whole new round that we've made up and we're back together again!

Share This Page