As I learned from chapters past, it's important to try and stay in the chapter that you're in, and enjoy it while it's lasting. Not be constantly worrying about where this step will take you - living in the potential future. Like a good meal. Like a good chef's tasting meal. You don't want to wonder what's next while you're eating the foie gras.

I often feel like books find us for reasons, and we read them when we need them the most.

Coming at the acting business as a technician, I really enjoy the process of working. I really enjoy being in a rehearsal room, starting a theatre piece for the first time. I really enjoy shooting in front of the crew, and I really love going on location. I think all that is just so exciting. So I've never really been drawn into the fame of being an actor, which in L.A., is part and parcel of the deal. I think for a lot of people, especially kids, it's hard to not get wrapped up in the world of the perks that the job brings.

For film, I audition just like everyone else, because it's a different set of casting directors.

Before babies, I worked very hard to make sure I understood my surroundings and figured out where I fit in the world, whether it was at work or whether it was in a social situation. And with kids, you just can't. The rule is you can't really do that because they dictate and they change so much so you just have to go with the flow more and be present and not have big expectations and be amused all the time.

I did enjoy singing the song, called "The Count", which is Count Olaf's big song that he sings to the kids when they first arrive with his henchpeople. He wrote it himself, and he thinks he's really, really talented, and it's a terrible song. So we had to learn intentionally bad choreography... We did these almost Lady Gaga-ish kind of movements, which were just awful, but that made me laugh

'Smurfs' just seemed like a great way to represent a young father to be, guy in a marriage, work in conflict, and I was really interested in the technical CG side of things. I'd never done a movie that I thought would be so physical and yet so precise. So I was intrigued by all of that.