My mom was Sicilian, my dad was Sicilian. Mom was a great cook, but all the women were.

I thought that if no one was going to give me a great part - and it was very difficult to break into film, obviously - then I'd write one myself.

Mental violence is as bad as physical violence. You don't see that very often in movies, so it was a good subject to tackle.

I had a 90-minute one-man show. I performed it and my life just exploded. Everything - my life just changed. Every writer, director, producer, studio head, movie star - they all wanted it. It was the hottest property since 'Rocky.'

The key is you have to keep doing the right thing. Do the right thing and stay around long enough, and you'll keep getting parts. And if you don't, you write your own parts, which I'm lucky to do. It's like anything else: you get hot, you get cold, then you get hot again. You just keep working.

I'm very proud of being Italian-American, but people don't realize that the mafia is just this aberration. The real community is built on the working man, the guy who's the cop, the fireman, the truck driver, the bus driver.

I've always been successful. Now I'm famous and successful.