From our perspective now, there is a not a huge understanding about the totalitarian Communism that Soviet Russia practiced during the 1950s - it was an atrocious system.

I was very interested in politics in college and was heading to be a lawyer. I have a degree in economics and I was interested in it. I hadn't really gotten super serious about it and I'd done a lot of student politics in high school. I really think it would be interesting and fun and challenging to go into politics.

Once you're a public figure, there's a certain amount of privacy you do give up.

[ Dalton Trumbo] always said he fought so many fights, all seemingly different, but all about the concepts of fairness and justice.

I love making people laugh. It's an addiction and it's probably dysfunctional, but I am addicted to it and there's no greater pleasure for me than sitting in a theater and feeling a lot of people losing control of themselves.

The success of the second 'Austin Powers' caught us by surprise a little bit. We had decided not to do even a second one, unless the audience wanted it and we could do something better.

I was always interested in the larger picture, I was pre-law in college, and had a degree in economics. I was very interested in the big question 'how then shall we live?,' how do we organize as a civilization when we are so different, and often don't get along, yet we know at some point we have to unite for the common good? I actually really care about those issues, and I'm driven to understand how it works.