The ability to have a choice in what you do is a privilege.

The way I see the job, my definition of it, is to create characters to the best of your ability and then fit into what's trying to be accomplished in the general framework of the film. I think that's whether you're doing this- even if you're doing musical theater. That's what I think an actors job is. I don't know. I like to think what an actors job is is to create characters.

I love academics, theory and all that. I love and admire that and try to do as much reading as I can.

I think you can always find interesting, complex and fascinating characters to play in different kinds of movies. It's in your hands.

Russia itself is an extremely complex country, and sometimes I feel like all of that comes back to haunt me. I can see why so many Russian writers were so tortured.

My playing music is strictly for fun. When I was in a band, I was really excited to talk about it since I had never really played music to that extent. It was never meant as something I would consider as anything more than having fun with my friends. But I think I would enjoy writing music for the movies that I'm working on.

I'm actually embarrassed to tell people I'm Russian these days, because it's become such an awful place.