I was just dying to get out of the constraints of television, and the constraints of the parts I'd been playing. I had taken a bunch of improv classes and was performing with The Groundlings. I wanted to get into more adult, risky stuff.

I allow myself to have my feelings of disappointment and discouragement, but never to sit and wallow in them. I meditate on positive energy, goals, and long-term happiness. Life has its ups and downs, so to expect otherwise is setting yourself up for disappointment.

John Belushi infused Animal House with this spirit of guerilla filmmaking. John Landis came from that world too, and all the National Lampoon writers were from that world. It was just chaos on film. Controlled chaos, though. We stayed very close to the script. It was a very formal kind of movie, if you look at it. Formally photographed and structured, with certain elements of improv.

And it soon became obvious to me that I had to process and keep my relationship with my ex-wife separate from that of my children. They didn't need or want too much personal information about our relationship. Change is good, and ultimately, creating a new path at this point in my life is energizing, creative, and rejuvenating.

The funny thing about The West Wing is - and I don't know what Aaron Sorkin says about it - but I'm convinced it was a comedy. It's a very intellectual and cerebral comedy, but it was SportsNight in the White House. It had an energy and a vitality and an intelligence and a passion that's rare. And it was extremely difficult to do, because they were so demanding about the dialogue.

I think it's that if you don't have the visual, you have to infuse the full personality into the voice. Think of Daffy Duck. I mean, what the heck? I was playing around with the Daffy Duck voice today when I was coming back from driving my kid to school.

I learned a hell of a lot from my co-star, Kurt Russell. He's one of my closest friends and was one of my best teachers. He was the pro. He approached it like a baseball player. Acting is a contact sport to him.