I think that for a lot of actors - especially American actors - to get line readings and to be told and have your director literally act out the part for you is sort of discouraging in a way. It's a very Eastern European thing to do - a lot of directors that I worked with in Russia did that as well. And, I never took that as an insult, as many actors tend to do. To me, I think it's just offering a certain energy - offering their flavor - and, instead of trying to sort of decode and communicate it to you, they just show you their flavor of what it should be.

Some people that are heroes to some can be looked at by another group of people as villains. As far as a middle point, just speaking for myself, that's exactly what to avoid.

I did come to L.A. to try to get on TV and get in front of a camera, so I could have a stage career in New York.

I come from athletics and I have a pretty big boxing background, so I never really shy away or get nervous about the physical rigors of filmmaking.

You've never seen anything in the Marvel universe that's as grounded, as gritty, as authentic, and as raw as what these guys did last year [in Season 1 of Daredevil]. What an amazing place to bring this character into, to attempt to up the stakes and to make it more dangerous. Hopefully, we were able to do that. But as far as those movies, my concern is this show.

I hope that I would put whatever my political beliefs aside, and realize that my country's asked me to to something, and do it.

I think so many great artists are flocking to LA because the downtown art scene is so vibrant, there is cheap living and you can really flourish as an artist there. There is an unbelievably supportive and really smart, talented theatre audience in LA full of young, hungry, vibrant people. It's something that sort of makes me think of what New York must have been like in its downtown theater scene in the 1980s - before my time.