I was an OK boxer, I wasn't great, I was OK, but I loved the discipline of getting together every Monday, Wednesday and Friday, usually Saturday afternoons too, with a whole bunch of mates and training, very, very hard for about two-and-half hours.

I just always wanted to be a baseball announcer. I'm a huge Mets fan, and I wanted to be the next Bob Murphy. As far as careers go, that was the first career that I really thought about. Well, before that, I wanted to be a Mello Yello truck driver.

Hollywood will put you in a box, so to speak. Some people will have seen you in 'La Bamba' or another dramatic film and think, 'Okay, that's what Lou does.' But they don't really have an idea of the range or diversity that I can bring to a project.

My father's best friend, Georgie Terra, was an Italian guy. The children and the cousins and nieces and nephews were children of the Mafia. Those were the children he grew up with. If you want to go to a safe neighborhood, go to where the Mafia is.

If you're driving, and a cop is behind you, you automatically think they're going to pull you over, but cops have so much more going on than to think about pulling you over. The last thing a real cop wants to do is write a ticket. That's the truth.

You develop relationships with people, and suddenly a family of actors and crew that you became so close to are now not around anymore. I'm not too sad about it because I got to move on to something else, but it's sad the way these things turn out.

The first movie I can remember ever seeing was Hard Times with Charles Bronson and James Coburn. My dad also introduced me to the likes of Jimmy Cagney... John Garfield... Robert Ryan... Steve McQueen... James Caan... Those are my fondest memories.

I was on record before I did 'The Hobbit,' saying I don't care at all about 3D. And I suppose I should now say I care a lot about 3D. I've always loved 3D, I think everything should be 3D, and I think it's just a shame 'The Godfather' wasn't in 3D.

I was a celebrity. This is not what I do for a living - politics. I play politicians, as well as working class or clergy or whatever, and you mustn't be confused by what you're seeing on television because that's not who I am. So I always ended it.

I fell in love with a civilian. Not an actress and not a famous actress at that. Because then the attention doesn't double - it grows exponentially. Because then suddenly everybody wants to be in your bedroom. But I don't really give them anything.

It's usually the exact same three things which are, the Scripts, the Director and the Role those are the three things I look for and really any two of them, If I get two of them that's usually enough, but definitely those are the things I look for.

As for my personal style, I like comfort a lot, like jeans and T-shirts. Having been a trainer for so long, I spend a lot of my days in tank tops, shorts, and T-shirts. Still, I do like the occasions where I get to wear suits and make that a thing.

So to any of us, whatever those things are: whatever it is we look up to, whatever it is we look forward to, and whoever it is we're chasin'. To that I say: Amen. To that I say: Alright, alright, alright. To that I say: Just keep livin'. Thank you.

Being in a relationship, I only appreciate when I come home from work how much I've given of myself at work or how depleted I am, and I sometimes worry that I've given all my best energy to my work, and all I can offer you is the emptied out shell.

The studios basically, besides developing some material, their strength is distribution. Distribution in any other business is a cost that you incur. You know, in a trucking business, you eat it. In a film business, distribution is a profit center.

Take the leap. If you love theater more than anything, take the leap. It's so rich if you give over fully to it; there are no halfers or returnsies in this business - if you don't... There's no way to go other than full tilt with your life and job.

National Health? Socialized pension funds? State-controlled television? Search and seizure laws? Forfeiture laws? If we're not living in the Soviet Union of the United States we certainly have returned to 1776 and 'taxation without representation.'

So to compare the Beatles, obviously the Beatles are the Beatles, but in hip-hop terms, Tribe is the Beatles. Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five are the Beatles. Big Daddy Kane is Jimi Hendrix. It means that much to people that grew up with it.

I was doing Hamlet in the off-season, and I had a specific idea in my mind about what I wanted that character to look like, and because it's going to lead into the next year, I knew that it was going to have to be established somewhere in the show.

People ask what gives me the authority to give advice? I say, First of all, I don't give advice. Dr Phil gives advice. Mr T helps people. I motivate them, I inspire them, I give them hope, and I plant the seed so they can feel good about themselves

It's jarring to go from one amazing experience to another that feels ordinary. I don't quite know how to explain it. You see the uniqueness of what you've been doing, and disassociating yourself from it and going back to the 'normal' life is tough.

When people embrace character, there's latzie. It's the stuffing of a scene that's not written. It's not in the stage direction and it's not in the words. When people embrace character, it informs their living, breathing moments in a scene so well.

I was shy. I was painfully shy, until fifth grade when I transferred to another school and befriended the class clown. And one day he was sick and I kinda stepped in for the class clown and I said, 'Wow, this is exciting, I'm a little bit nervous.'

If I'm doing some weird tick with my mouth, or not standing still or something, I'll be the first person to notice it, and then want to change that. I think it's important just to maintain trajectory, to not just use your same tricks over and over.

I think it takes a strong man to be in a relationship with a strong woman. A lot of people hear the word "diva" and think of it as a negative. I see it as a positive. I want somebody who knows what they want out of life and isn't afraid to show it.

I think it takes a strong man to be in a relationship with a strong woman. A lot of people hear the word 'diva' and think of it as a negative. I see it as a positive. I want somebody who knows what they want out of life and isn't afraid to show it.

Even though I am fortunate to have certain luxuries, sometimes, I am even amazed by what people with money have and do. I want to remind people that just because you might be rich and famous, it doesn't mean you have to take yourself too seriously.

I was 14 when the wall came down, so I only ever knew about the GDR or experienced it as a kid. I lived very far away from it, and you only ever thought about the GDR when you saw the Olympics, because you were like, "How are they always winning?!"

When I was a boy, my older brothers listened to Earth, Wind & Fire and Kool and the Gang. When I would try to get into their room, they would close the door and say, 'You can't hear that. It's not for a child!' Now, I can listen to it and enjoy it.

There are these girls who live in Maryland: they're the Patrick Super Fan Club Association of America. They've sent me videotapes of themselves just eating and talking about Hanson, and a loaf of bread that was really moldy by the time it got here.

On 'There Will Be Blood,' I was cast at the last minute. I had 3 and a half to 4 days to get ready for the first day. I just went for it, threw myself in there and gave it everything I had. That was just guts and instinct, not a lot of preparation.

A rebel is a nonconformist who is constantly saying no, and I'm not that. I'm a conformist and I believe in progress, and you can't make much progress by saying no all the time. A rebel is destructive. I know I have something constructive to offer.

I'm a very competitive person. I always have been. And it's hard to be competitive about something as amorphous as acting. But you can be competitive on the track, because the rules are very simple and the declaration of the winner is very concise.

There are lots of things that you can go down the list and say, "Oh, these are cliches, we've seen this before, just hits every checkpoint." All of that takes a secondary status for me if I'm reading something and I just really like the characters.

Crime is interesting. It's huge and fascinating, and it's what my business, TV and film, is largely based on. But the realities are tragic, and in crime drama you rarely see the pain of bereavement or any consequences. It's reduced to a chess game.

I'm really a big fan of HBO and Showtime shows, so I wouldn't mind being on an edgy show... where I could challenge myself to do gritty stuff - a homeless guy or just some guy with a lot going on who's got problems. It's more fun to do as an actor.

Hopefully, the guys will work on a 'Conchords' film because the world deserves it. That's up to them, because we're all keen to do it. It's about finding the time and the right story. All I can do is encourage them and then wait for the phone call.

It always depresses me when people moan about how commercial Christmas is. I love everything about it. The tradition of having this great big feast, slap bang in the middle of winter, is an essential thing to look forward to at the end of the year.

One problem is that we are heavily dependent upon fossil fuels. And that's where the greenhouse gases come from, by and large, some deforestation, as well. But we have not yet come to grips with how to change that. So that's where we are right now.

I am so grateful for One Day At A Time, even though for years and years and years people would go, "Oh, you were on One Day At A Time." I [am on the show] for about seven months and then this haunts me for the rest of my life. No, I had no regrets.

In my whole career, in fact, I can remember only two first nights when a show was at its peak on the first night. And I just wish we could devise a system where critics came not on a single evening but were given a choice of performances to attend.

I had a very bad time with acid. I did that classic thing of looking in the mirror by mistake and seeing the devil. But I took it several times, because you always think that next time you might have the wonderful time that everyone else is having.

My taxes alone keep eight lawyers busy, and when I finally get my money, it's only one-third of what I earn. With the kids in school and my other responsibilities, I get no change back from the first million dollars. The money flows out like water.

Only comedians can talk about death, life, God and Virgin Mary. If I was a tragic actor, I couldn't allow myself. But with this accent I can do it. I can talk with death in person because I am a clown. Yes. And I am proud to be a clown - very much.

I am a creator of TV shows. 'Lifestyle' ran for 14 years... that was pleasurable. We also had 'Runaway' for eight years. We did two years of a show called 'The Start of Something Big', and we did a network series called 'Fame, Fortune and Romance.'

I try to make as much time as I can for R5, because I love it so much. Ultimately, that's what's going to be around forever in my life. Because with 'Austin & Ally,' our season is going to end, and then that will be it. But R5 will always be there.

I don't really think of myself as a heartthrob. I've got a lot of brothers, and there's a natural competitiveness between us when it comes to girls. If I said something about being a heartthrob, then they would bring me straight back down to earth!

I'm a huge Bob Hope fan, up until about the late '50s. I've seen so many of his movies up until then, and they're a big influence on me and a big influence on Woody Allen, who is basically just ripping off Bob Hope for his first five or six movies.

You become a victim of your own success. It's what happens in TV when Fox has a big hit with the X-Files. And they start chasing and the rest of their shows suffer. Because the experimentation that made the X-Files a show is all of the sudden lost.

Liberace was a miracle. You talk about who he was and what he did, and then you look at who he inspired, from Elton John to Cher to Michael Jackson to Bette Midler. There are so many people that came to see him. Elvis was there, watching his shows.

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