The script was given to me by one of my agents and they didn't tell me anything about it. My first reaction was, "The West Wing? Is it about a squadron of fighter jets?" Then I turned the page and saw, 'by Aaron Sorkin' and I knew it was going to be something good.

You wouldn't want somebody in office who hasn't experienced life.

I was not familiar with the book [before filming in The Outsiders] , though. Interestingly, The Outsiders had not reached the point where it is now, where it's required reading in sixth and seventh grades. In my sixth and seventh grade, we did not, but today everyone does.

Actually, if I had to do it over [leaving the show the West Wing], I'd do the same thing, because lost in the shuffle of it is that Aaron [Sorkin] left the same year I did. And I would not have wanted to be on The West Wing with somebody else writing it.

Trying to execute that kind of intricate staging in the West Wing at the same time you're doing intricate dialogue - it's like patting your head and rubbing your stomach!

About Last Night... [movie] still stands up for me. Like, I'm as proud of that today and still have the kind of faith in it today to show it to a young couple as I did when it came out.

The press concentrates on a divorce an actor's going through and they ignore the good performances he gives, or the causes that he works for.