I refuse to cater to the bullshit of innocence.

There should be a place where only the things you want to happen, happen.

My father could be very witty, even if the humor was always on the darker side of irony.

To get a child's trust - you may know or not - is a very hard thing to do. They're so used to not believing adults - because adults tell tales and lies all the time.

What is the point of it all? Not leaving legacies. But being ripe. Being ripe.

Then one day my sister abandoned me at the 1939 World's Fair, and that incident is the essence of In the Night Kitchen. I was standing there with hundreds of other people waving back at the little midgets dressed like bakers when I turned around and my sister was gone! The next thing I know I'm screaming and crying and policemen are taking me to a big place with tons of kids who had all been abandoned like me. At least I was old enough to give them a name and an address.

I became a set designer for opera. I'm a great opera buff, I love classical music, and I needed a time-out.