What I can't completely understand is most other people's fascination with what the famous among us do with their lips and the rest of their bodies. Why do ordinary people become the target of this curiosity simply by virtue of the fact that other people recognise their names and faces but know almost nothing else about them?

You know what my earliest memories are? Going from one burlesque town to another. My father was in burlesque.

If scientists can't communicate with the public, with policy makers, with one another, the future is going to be held back. We're not going to have the future that we could have.

For me, I find that even though I've accomplished a few things in my life, looking back on accomplishments doesn't give me a sense of satisfaction.

I find the idea of walking down the aisle and then being handed to the groom by the father very romantic.

A woman must make her fortune before she is 30; or work after she is 30; or get married.

I love the detail about the workings of the human heart and mind that only fiction can provide - film can't get in close enough.

There's nothing in the world like the devotion of a married woman. It's a thing no married man knows anything about.