I'm the first to admit this whole salary thing is getting out of control. In the final analysis, it's still about the work.

In retrospect it always seems to work out that you can look back on something that was a disaster and find some gems in there.

I try to stay in decent shape always. I pride myself on staying at least a month away from really good shape.

The character is what trips you up - the thing of, "I'm going to get so dark in this character that I'm going to get lost in a character." You can't get lost in a character. You can only think you're lost in a character.

There are peaks, there are valleys. But they're all kind of carved and smoothed out, and it feels like a low level of despair you live in. Where you're not getting any answers, but you're living OK. And you can smile at the office. You know? But it's a low level of despair. I was on Prozac for a long time. It may have helped me out of a jam for a little bit, but people stay on it forever. I had to get off at a certain point because I realized that, you know, everything's just OK.

I don't feel any pressure to be funny at all. I'm funny because I want to be funny. I could sit here and be serious for an hour and you would go away and make me much funnier than I am.

I'm very serious about no alcohol, no drugs. Life is too beautiful.