When I step back from any moment of crisis that I've ever had, I'm always struck by how humor and tragedy can kind of live in the same moment, holding hands together. How life can go from the ridiculous to the sublime to the tragic all in one breath.

My parents are actually very hip. They're way hipper than me.

I was born in the West Village in New York, and then when I was about four my family moved to what they joke is the suburbs, the Upper West Side. I lived there for most of my childhood.

When father was younger than me he came to New York to be in musicals and was in a number of them. But he, at that time in his life, didn't feel he could fully commit to a creative life - he had this voice in the back of his head that said, "I need to make money." So that propelled him to open up an ice cream parlor, which then spawned into a number of different food businesses and took over his life for 20 years.

My philosophy is that if you're playing a moment truthfully, that it's a funny moment, then hopefully it will be funny. I like to just go for a truth in the work as much as I can. There's a lack of ego when you're working with comedy that I really love. It's hard to come up with something funny. It's become a fun game in a way. Everyone is going for the gold, for that humor.

My father is also gifted at business, which is a blessing and a curse, because if you have the kind of mind that he does where you can do anything very well, that in its own way is sort of limiting.

If you feel like you're working with good people, you give them your humanity and just let it happen.