I do think homophobia in the '80s was more rampant and socially acceptable.

Wonder Showzen is one of my favorite shows of all time. When I first saw it, I thought it was so funny and new and original and edgy and insane and subversive. I didn't know comedy could do that.

Comedy is often about pain.

I think part of it is the fact that they were kind of the first of its kind - there weren't a lot of cartoons for adults. People forget at the time that The Simpsons started out, it was controversial - the fact that they said "hell" and "damn" in a cartoon was a lot. America was in an uproar.

[The people that worked on The Simpsons] just had good taste. They knew how to execute absurd jokes.

I think we give human beings too much credit. We're primates, you know.

I feel the acting conservatory taught me how to be a working actor in the 1700s. We learned stuff like 'to the back of the auditorium, to the back of the auditorium' and the liquid "u." 'The payment is duuue on Tuuuesday.' I also learned how to fence. If anything, when I moved to Los Angeles, I didn't fit in, in any way. I had to do comedy, because I was talking so pretentiously.