Cynicism is kind of like folding your arms and stepping back and commenting on things, like the old guys in 'The Muppets,' just throwing out comments all the time, whereas there are other people on the ground really trying to affect things and improve their lives and the lives of other people. I think it's noble and I think it's cool.

It never made sense to me that someone would achieve any kind of success in show business, only to become a jerk.

An obsessive attention to the news, I've realized, only serves to paint a picture of the world as a throbbing blob of dysfunction, most news falling somewhere on a scale from disappointing to calamitous.

And so, however many people watch this thing, that's how many different opinions there will be about it. But I don't feel like it has an agenda in terms of its ideology. It just presents a story like a mirror. It's a mirror more than it is than a distorted mirror.

No matter how dark things may get in a story, I feel it's the responsibility of the storyteller to leave the audience with at least a shred of hope.

There's that great Bill Hicks line - the comedian - where he says, "Are you proud to be an American?" "I don't know. It's just where my parents had sex."

I kicked college nostalgia in my late 20s. As much as I loved college and treasure the memories, I no longer want to go back.