I think the thing I had going for me is a good pedigree and joke-writing ability. But a good pedigree, for the audience, doesn’t matter past the first 90 seconds."

I get music from odd places that I assume are fairly typical at this point. I'll just go on iTunes, go to EDM and just look at the Top 100, or I'll go on the Beats app and look on the playlists that are sort of curated.

If you're into social justice it's hard not to be on black people's side.

I do have weird habits when I'm directing, or even think as a director, like when I move a cup, I make sure to put it back in the exact right place.

Making music on TV used to be as common as commercials. In the '60s and '70s, prime time was stuffed with variety shows headlined by such major and treasured talents as Carol Burnett, Red Skelton, the Smothers Brothers and Richard Pryor, who had a very brief comedy-variety hour on NBC that was censored literally to death.

I've played farce on the stage, but I have never played any sort of comedy on the screen.

If you are doing stand-up comedy, you have to be confident in what you are doing. That doesn't mean just because you are confident you are funny.

Growing up, a film was an action film or it was a comedy or it was romantic, but you don't really see such stark lines between genres nowadays.