They killed me in The Sopranos. I went to David Chase, and I said, "Why me? I'm a detective! You can use me forever!" And he told me, "John, there's a rule in television: Somebody has to die that the audience likes."

That show, The Sopranos put HBO on the map. So there I was - and then there I wasn't. Too bad. The same thing happened to me on Prison Break: I got the role of the governor on that, and then a handful of episodes later, I hanged myself.

After The Sopranos, my mother said, "Couldn't there be some raft floating under the bridge when you jumped? Or couldn't you have a twin brother?" I said, "Yeah, if they'd wanted me that bad. But they don't."

Paul Schrader, he's a... son of a gun. He's a very feisty, very straightforward guy. He's your auteur director. He sent me to a fat farm down in Palm Springs, I think it was, and got mad because he said, "You're just getting massages and backrubs!" He got the bill, he looked at the itemization, and he said, "You're not doing anything to lose weight! I could've had William Hurt for this part!" And I said, "Well, you're stuck with me, so..." He was funny, though.

They killed me in The Sopranos. I went to David Chase, and I said, "Why me? I'm a detective! You can use me forever!" And he told me, "John, there's a rule in television: Somebody has to die that the audience likes."

Griffin Dunne and I were both terrified that Martin Scorsese didn't think we were very good - and if he didn't think we were very good, that was it. That was the end of the line. If Martin Scorsese thinks you stink, you stink.

I was a barfly, so going to work and acting and rehearsing and then going and sitting in a bar and drinking and then going home was sort of my lifestyle. And there was none of that out here in the '70s when I was lucky enough to get movies, and nobody else that I knew was working in movies at that point. I didn't really have a lot of movie friends.