When I read the script for Will & Grace in 1998, I knew I was the only guy for the part.

My wife is a real camper; it's a nice way to bond.

I'd never been to Africa. This really was my first film [The Lost World]. I'd done 10 years of stage. I'd done a little bit of television. But this was my first film.

So this ["Grant MacLaren"] was a chance to sort of go back and do a more leading man. But instead of just solving crimes like a CSI show, this leading man is, like the other travelers, not who he appears.

Rachael Leigh Cook was my leading lady. She was awesome. We loved the show [Perception ]. Again, it was more of a TNT show, because there were crimes that got solved, which [going] back five years ago, was a mandate. But there was something innovative about the mental illness side of it.

Every actor has periods of their life that are a little less busy than others, and that was just a time when I needed that. And to be back on a sitcom stage, with Julia [ Louis-Dreyfus], was really, really fun.

I had a couple of decent laughs on Townies, but for the most part, delivering a joke that you just know is not funny is hard.