As an actor, you always have to reinvent yourself or you end up in the gutter somewhere. It's my job to always change people's minds. I've known that for a long time and I've had to do it.

I believe that Ryan Murphy is a genius. His instincts remind me of Andy Warhol. I recently went to the Warhol museum in Pittsburgh, and you can see a lot of echoes of Andy in Ryan’s work. Like Andy, Ryan’s finger is so on the pulse of culture that he’s ahead of culture. Their aesthetic and their vision of the world are very similar.

Jerry Bruckheimer really is an executive producer, who obviously is the most successful producer in the history of film and television.

We shared the same vision.

I did a movie with Clint Eastwood and I knew I wasn't going to be able to 'out-man' him.

I've always been fascinated by Baretta and Donny Brasco, and other undercover cops in movies.

My past is not pleasant; I grew up in a very tough town, Waterbury, Connecticut. I grew up in New York, too, but Waterbury was tougher.