Corey Stoll

Growing up, I used to babysit, but, thinking back on what I was like at 15, this was probably a terrible idea.

I made a choice in my career to not get hair plugs and not hide the fact that I was balding, and I've managed to play all sorts of characters who have shaved heads.

I grew up really into comic books, and I actually thought I was going to be a comic-book artist. That was my ambition before I realized I couldn't keep characters looking the same from panel to panel.

I never really knew what to do with my hair to begin with. When I was fat, I had incredibly long, unkempt hair. And there was kind of a poetic justice to losing something I was hiding behind.

When you're in a theater, it's about reaching the back rows. When you have a camera in your face, it's just about knowing the size of the room.

There's a ton of stories that can come out of L.A. I actually think that even though I enjoy being in New York more, I think that L.A. is a really fascinating place.

I think, sometimes, actors having a holistic view of what they're in can be overrated. Especially when you're playing somebody as narcissistic and self-involved as Ernest Hemingway, it doesn't really matter what else is in the script.

What's really fun as the villain is working to get the audience to hate you.

The very act of saying anything more nuanced than 'us good, them bad' is under attack, and I'm proud to stand with artists who do.

What was so brilliant about 'Girls' was that they allowed their characters to be ludicrous and selfish and faulted but didn't shy away from a deeper psychological foundation for that neuroses.

I think part of being masculine is not needing to prove it and not needing to answer for it.

You can make bad writing 'OK,' but... you really need to start with a good script and with characters that are three-dimensional and with great dialogue. It's a difficult lesson to learn because good writing is hard to come by, but it's definitely worth chasing.