When I think about growing up, I feel most affected by two travels that I made working in cargo boats when I was 16 and 18. One of them crossed through the Mississippi and Baton Rouge and Mobile, Alabama, and another went all the way to Europe.

I think there's nothing wrong with being fixated on superheroes when you are 7 years old, but I think there's a disease in not growing up.

I think that the best things come from thought, without thinking. I think that's the smartest use of the intelligence that we all have.

I think intelligence basically can be in a way defined by the possibility of having two opposite ideas living together and at the same time functioning. That's why I think a smart script has two things living in the same place, and they're absolutely contradictory.

I have this very abstract idea in my head. I wouldn't even want to call it stand-up, because stand-up conjures in one's mind a comedian with a microphone standing onstage under a spotlight telling jokes to an audience. The direction I'm going in is eventually, you won't know if it's a joke or not.

This satire business, that was one of the worst things that ever happened to me. I was certified funny. From then on, I had to be funny - people expected it. Twice the work for the same pay.

I'd like to play a mixture of Lucille Ball meets Murphy Brown meets Glenn Close on 'Damages,' to keep a little bit of the darkness in there. I like dark comedy a lot.

Don't wish me happiness - I don't expect to be happy it's gotten beyond that, somehow. Wish me courage and strength and a sense of humor - I will need them all.