It's amazing what you can get if you quietly, clearly and authoritatively demand it.

While I am overwhelmingly proud of work that I, believe me, did not do on my own, I can assure you that awards have very little bearing on my own personal happiness, my own sense of well-being and purpose in the world.

Pretending is a very valuable life skill.

Acting is not about being someone different. It's finding the similarity in what is apparently different, then finding myself in there.

When your kids come home, they don't necessarily want to talk to you. They just want to know you're standing there, ready to talk.

That consciousness of quality, and the need to demand it can galvanize your energies, not just in your work, but in a rigorous exercise of mind and heart in every aspect of your life.

When my children were very young and I was working I had someone cooking for me. I don't have a cook now, I haven't had one for a number of years and I do it myself. But when they were all little it was hard to pay attention to everyone's homework at the end of the day and make dinner.