As an actor, you're listening to the other person and always trying to be present and take everything they're giving you, but when they're not there you have to produce that yourself.

My favorite actor on the planet is Gena Rowlands and she plays women who, to me, somehow defy gender. They are women, they are feminine, they are masculine, they are everything. There's something exciting about that. I don't know how to articulate it exactly. I guess it's busting out of the archetypes a little bit and not feeling restricted.

I think the improv also helps with the imagination of dealing this person across from me who's not physically there. When you do an improv scene, you're usually working on a blank stage and creating the props and creating the environment.

My mom taught me German before I knew English. And I went to French immersion school.

It's the reason we go to films and watch television: to escape the mundane nature of life and see another world and see ourselves in that other world. I think that's what sci-fi does so well.

I've learned a lot about the limits of what I can do, as an artist, or what I'm willing to do. It's a lot of responsibility to carry a show and to speak to people on different levels.

Just to be on set with Amy Poehler, who's one of my heroes, was a total dream come true.