And I say, 'Hey, Lama, hey, how about a little something, you know, for the effort, you know.' And he says, 'Oh, uh, there won't be any money. But when you die, on your deathbed, you will receive total consciousness.' So I got that goin' for me, which is nice.

I don't feel like it's pressure. It's more of an obligation - not to entertain or be funny, but to have a certain levity. I mean, there's got to be a lightness in your leg. You have to be as light as you can be, and you don't have to be weighted down, stuck in your emotions and stuck in your body, stuck in your head. You just want to try and elevate something.

I lost my phone and I just really didn't look for it. It was the nicest feeling, like six weeks. ... A couple of times I needed to use a telephone, and I was always able to touch someone that had a telephone and say, "Hey, can I use your phone? May I please?" And they'd say, "Sure." And that was it! So it was OK, it was a real vacation. I took a real vacation from myself.

Everyone needs to take a vacation from the sort of automatic things you do.

I was at the New York Film Critics Circle Awards one year - they called me up when somebody canceled two days before the thing, and asked me to present some awards. So I went, and one of the funniest film moments I've ever had was when they introduced the New York film critics. They all stood up - motley isn't the word for that group. Everybody had some sort of vision problem, some sort of damage - I had to bury myself in my napkin.

I realized the more fun I had, the more relaxed I was working, the better I worked.

I think midlife crisis is just a point where people's careers have reached some plateau and they have to reflect on their personal relationships.