While F.D.R. once told Americans that we have nothing to fear but fear itself, Mr. Ashcroft is delighted to play the part of Fear Itself, an assignment in which he lets his imagination run riot.

What was most striking about the Obama speech in Berlin was not anything he said so much as the alternative reality it fostered: many American children have never before seen huge crowds turn out abroad to wave American flags instead of burn them.

I'm always struck by the kids who turn up in New York and LA, and places in between. Chicago. Wanting to do theater, wanting to do independent film. Wanting to break into television or radio.

The most wonderful street in the universe is Broadway. It is a world within itself. High and low, rich and poor, pass along at a rate peculiar to New York, and positively bewildering to a stranger.

If Obama needs to be criticized, I will criticize him. There's a tremendous amount of excitement about him. And a corollary of that is, as we're learning, from newspapers and magazines that are going into overdrive reprinting Obama editions, etc.

I grew up in Washington, D.C. But also loving the theater.

When something really comes from the soul, I think it has a truth that you cannot find in politics.