The key research I usually apply that allows me to understand the roles that I take on, starts with the script in front of me, and what it offers. I try to absorb as much of it as I can, in the time that I have to study it, and I like to change things up, if I have a choice in the matter... and I usually don't. I dream on it, write about and find out who the individual is, and try to bring him to life with as much human and truth as I can.

I wanted to be a cartoonist. I was one of those kids who sat around and drew in my room all the time.

Film, for me, has been a process of learning on the job.

[Pawn Sacrifice is] about the 1972 chess championship between Bobby Fischer and Boris Spassky. I play Paul Marshall.It was a great story of a very peculiar man, another genius who's troubled and lived an interesting life. I had great fun making that.

It's nice to be able to challenge myself by playing real people. But at the same time it utilizes a different part of the brain to just invent new things.

Things never go the way you expect them to. That's both the joy and frustration in life. I'm finding as I get older that I don't mind, though. It's the surprises that tickle me the most, the things you don't see coming.

I love Seth Rogen's line in which he talks about how you can be both a genius and decent at the same time.