Ambition without contribution is of no significance.

I can play characters who sing, but I don't like singing in a nightclub or something. It's not my metier.

Lots of people fantasize about what it would be like if they were president... Most think they'd be decent and wouldn't be corrupted at all, that they'd remain true to themselves.

Nothing makes an actor feel freer and more inventive and more creative than being trusted.

But you have to trust your instincts. Because you're not going to try it 20 different ways during rehearsal. You'll try it two or three different ways, maybe, but then you've got five other scenes you're shooting that day. You've got to keep going.

When you have satire, it has to be real. No matter how outrageous the comedy becomes, you have to believe in the characters.

I totally related to Cole Porter's magnetic pull to any piano that was in the room, which he was famous for doing, as was Gershwin. You couldn't drag them away from a piano.