I have a bit of a bucolic kind of upbringing, and so I certainly bring an amalgamation of different people that I've met over the course of my life, especially before moving to Los Angeles, so I guess my childhood was my homework in a lot of ways for Harlan County.

An actor that tells you that they have real choices between material is, for the most part, lying. There are very few people that have opportunities. But what you do have where I am in my career, is saying no to the things that seem repetitious. For me, I always look for material that allows me to bring my worldview to it. And those opportunities, since the beginning of The Shield, have grown exponentially.

My heroes are Robert Duvall, Forest Whitaker, Ed Harris, Tommy Lee Jones, Anthony Hopkins and Sean Penn.

If you ever get the opportunity to work with Quentin Tarantino, you had better believe that it will be an experience of extremes.

Tarantino and Jackson is like Scorsese and DeNiro, and their silent communication.

I'm not good at telling a joke, but I can say a line in a certain way that makes people uncomfortable because they don't know whether to laugh or not, and I love that comedy.

But probably my favorite music, believe it or not, is sad music.