I was ecstatic they re-named 'French Fries' as 'Freedom Fries'. Grown men and women in positions of power in the U.S. government showing themselves as idiots.
I was a million percent in love with Edward Scissorhands. I remember looking in the mirror on the last day of shooting... and thinking how sad I was to be saying goodbye to Edward.
'Edward Scissorhands' was tough to let go of because I found real safety in allowing myself to be that open, that honest. To explore purity. It was a hard one to walk away from.
I marketed pens - on the phone. But the beauty of the gig was that you had to call these strangers and say, 'Hi, how ya doing?' You made up a name, like, 'Hey, it's Edward Quartermaine from California. You're eligible to receive this grandfather clock or a trip to Tahiti.' You promise them all these things if they buy a gross of pens.
I suppose the only thing at 50 you can really start to look forward to is just total irresponsibility. As you get older, you can just sit in a chair, wear anything you want, you know you can walk down; old people dress cool. You know they wear sweatpants. The elderly have it down.
I've had the honor and the pleasure and gift of having known Elizabeth Taylor for a number of years. You know, you sit down with her, she slings hash, she sits there and cusses like a sailor, and she's hilarious.
Escapism is survival to me.
For me, it's always more difficult and slightly exposing to play something that's close to yourself. I always like to try to hide, just because I can't stand the way I look.
What attracted me to Jimmy Bulger were the various facets of his personality and his humanity because I felt that the only way I could approach playing a character like him was to find his human side first and then map that out to see where it took the turn. He was a very complicated man.
I have known plenty of people who, in their later years, had the energy of children and the kind of curiosity and fascination with things like little children. I think we can keep that, and I think it's important to keep that part of staying young. But I also think it's great fun growing old.
I may have a feather duster down my pants.
I was angry and frustrated until I started my own family and my first child was born. Until then I didn't really appreciate life the way I should have, but fortunately I woke up.
It's funny, because what happens to me when I read a script, when something grabs hold of me, I start getting these flashes of people or places or things or images.
It's such a funny thing when you see your daughter transitioning from your baby, your little girl, to suddenly being a young woman. If you're not really looking for it, you can miss it, and Lily-Rose is on that road already, and there's nothing I can do to stop it.
I started out printing silk screen t-shirts. I sold ink pens. I worked construction. I worked at a gas station. I pumped gas. I was a mechanic for a little bit. I went into sewers, down into sewer lines. I had a lot of somewhat unpleasant gigs for a time there.
I started out as a guitarist in the early '80s.
I think, as an actor, it is good to feel the fear of failing miserably. I think you should take that risk. Fear is a necessary ingredient in everything I do. But if I do 'Hamlet,' it will probably be in a small theater on a small stage, and it will have to be very, very soon because I'm getting a little long in the tooth for it.
People say I make strange choices, but they're not strange for me. My sickness is that I'm fascinated by human behavior, by what's underneath the surface, by the worlds inside people.
It's very, very important to me, no matter who the person is, to play that person with the utmost degree of truth that I'm able to bring. But playing a character like Jack Sparrow or Willy Wonka, that requires nothing but a degree of responsibility to the intent of the story - responsibility to the film-maker to deliver the goods.
America is dumb. It's like a dumb puppy that has big teeth that can bite and hurt you - aggressive. My daughter is four; my boy is one. I'd like them to see America as a toy - a broken toy. Investigate it a little, check it out, get this feeling, and then get out.