Bette Davis, she was so brilliant and one of my heroes, but she worked a ton, and then she didn't get All About Eve [1950] until the last minute. Claudette Colbert was supposed to be Margo Channing, but then she broke her back and couldn't do it. That allowed Davis to play her age.

Certainly with The Crucible, what I love is that every role in that is so crucial.But there's something almost comic. I remember there's that line where she says, "I am 18 and a woman, however single," which killed me every time!

I remember when I did Little Women, I didn't watch the Katharine Hepburn one over and over, which I thought I would do. Heathers, I was completely obsessed with.

I was regarded as the school freak which further reinforced a lot of inhibitions and doubts I had about myself. I was a shy, frightened teenager for a long time.

Bette Davis in All About Eve was huge for me. Her acting was staggering.

One thing you have to have when you act is energy.

My parents really instilled this idea in me of being your own person, almost to the extent that I couldn't do wrong. I'd get a bad grade and they'd be like, "No! What you did was great!"