Over a spell of about three years, I played a series of roles that were, for me, all very different, but most of them came out within a six-month period. They all dealt with a kind of dark territory that in some cases had been mined before in movies.

I feel it's a responsibility for anyone who breaks through a certain ceiling... to send the elevator back down and give others a helpful lift.

Im attracted to things that are challenging and fun and interesting, and it certainly seems that audiences enjoy them as well.

The characters created cannot just be a mouthpiece for the writer. When you look at a piece of writing, and it's genuine and it doesn't feel like every character is just a mouthpiece for the writer, but that they've been created in such a way that they're expressing an idea that a writer wants to get across, that's when a story succeeds.

Why not sit around a Beverly Hills pool collecting residual cheques? That is not the kind of life I want.

Am I now supposed to go on Oprah and cry and tell you my deepest, darkest secrets because you want to know?

The movies are not my first priority - the theater is.