I realized early on that success was tied to not giving up.

When I met scientists, I found them to be as various as any other group of people.

I think people only have so much interest in anybody, and if you barrage them in between the times you have something to offer them you become a personality rather than an actor - much more short-lived. I only work once a year. And that's enough.

I think parenting is a huge responsibility. It was in my time when I was growing up and there still continues to be that responsibility.

I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life, so nothing of what I was studying seemed to fit. I know now that I should have taken advantage of that time and that I missed a great deal of the opportunity to educate myself.

I have the ordinary experience of having the blender bottom come off in my room upstairs. I have the ordinary experience of being anonymous when I'm in an airplane talking to air-traffic control, and they don't know who they're talking to. I have a lot of common experiences. What's important is to be able to see yourself, as having commonality with other people and not determine, because of your good luck, that everybody is less significant, less interesting, less important than you are.

I haven't purposefully set out to play heroes. I'm interested in playing the character who finds himself in extraordinary circumstances. But he's really either just saving himself or acting in the service of something that's important to him.