My wife, as proud as she was of me, hated show business for good reasons. There was something about the spouse always being pushed out of the way, shoved aside. She wanted to get away from it.

I went public with the alcoholism, very early on... the early '70s. Mercedes McCambridge, the actress, I think was the first recognizable person that went before Congress and talked about it, and I thought that was a good idea, to take some of the stigma away from it and say "Normal, average people can fall prey to it." So it's been public for me. I did a movie about an alcoholic. And today, you're nobody unless you've been to rehab. It seems like everybody has some kind of an addiction.

Longevity in my family's been pretty good. And my grandparents were pretty spry at their age, so I figured I'd probably stay skinny and fairly agile. I used to do old men all the time in sketches. And there used to be an organization called the Gray Panthers. And they would send me, oh, terrible letters about making fun of old people. And I would just always say, "I'm playing the old person I intend to become!"

I never wanted to be an actor and to this day I don`t. I can`t get a handle on it. An actor wants to become someone else. I am a song-and-dance man and I enjoy being myself, which is all I can do.

My work is just a hobby. No, I wouldn't want to do it professionally. It's too hard. Deadlines are no fun. But I can sit and tweak all night and not worry about time.

My kids are so much better parent than I was.

I wasn't a falling-in-the-gutter type. I drank at home because it relaxed me. I was shy around new people, but after a drink or two, I became more sociable.