I've been a professional actor for almost 40 years.

I've never been pigeonholed and I've experienced so many different kinds of skin - what man will do and won't do, what you should do and shouldn't do. This is what's exciting about being an actor; where philosophy majors sit in classrooms or write books about human behavior, we're actually acting them out in front of cameras.

I've been busy and not busy, and busy is better. I've been busy, but I went through a lot of periods where it was lean for a lot of times.

I think in the early part of my career, the roles were so disparate that it never gave anybody an opportunity to understand my essence and what I would be good at doing, as opposed to what I would not be good at doing, so these little moments of beautiful things that were happening to me were consistent, but very few and very far between.

Creativity was definitely a big part of our household, and I remember always writing stories and being encouraged to be creative.

I grew up in an non-athletic family, where my parents were interested in music, in literature, in education and art.

But only art and music have the power to bring peace.

When we were children, every day after school, my brother and sister and I would go to my mother's office. It was full of pencils and marker and fabrics and beads. It was so much fun to be a child and to express my creativity through drawing and to playing dress-up in all of the wonderful and colorful clothes.