We're here for such a short time. When your great-great-grandkids study history, don't you want them to be proud that you were part of the solution?

I grew up in and the teachers. I think I was very lucky. I think I had a lot of social capital, and so when I found myself in this position of influence, I just - then I started to engage a bit with some of the problems in the world and realize that I could actually have an impact.

Paranoid is what people who are trying to take advantage call you in an effort to get you to drop your guard.

If we listen to the better angels of our nature, there are creative and good solutions to serious problems.

The whole thrust of theatre is different, just because the writing is so much more respected in a play. Whereas in movies - and having been the writer, I can say from experience - the writer is lower down on the food chain.

[Americans] can't understand that the water in our toilet is cleaner than 880 million have access to.

I've been left alone, even by the paparazzi, because what sells is sex and scandal. Absent that, they really don't have much interest in you. I'm still married, still working, still happy.