I knew it was time to get off of reality TV when someone asked me if I sang as well as acted.
I left school and couldn't find acting work, so I started going to clubs where you could do stand-up. I've always improvised, and stand-up was this great release. All of a sudden, it was just me and the audience.
Acting helped me as I was growing up. It helped me learn about myself, helped me travel, helped me understand life, express myself, all those wonderful things. So I'm very, very grateful; it's a fun job. It's a luxury.
Among other things, Marching Band forms state that if my kid starts acting like a li'l jerkface on a trip, Marching Band can call and command me to pick up my li'l jerkface.
A truly good book teaches me better than to read it. I must soon lay it down, and commence living on its hint. What I began by reading, I must finish by acting.
My acting ability would have sent me back to the post office. It was my singing that got me jobs. Ironically, now, people think of me as an actor and don't know me much as a singer.
I took a psychology class, and I think the study of the mind can help me further my acting ability. It's also taught me about getting into an environment with new people and acting like you've known them forever.
People always ask me if I'm going to stop modeling because I have started an acting career. I hope to continue to model for years to come.
I've been fortunate with my acting career. A lot of scripts come to me. I don't mind auditioning if something that requires that, but I haven't had to in awhile, which is a nice place to be 'cause I've been on quite a lot of auditions in my life.
I was pursuing my acting career, but I was silent on the LGBT issue, the issue that was closest to me. I knew if I came out then, I'd have had to change careers.
I never had had a large group of friends, so I often felt a little out of place and like I was in a different mindset from everyone else around me because I was so focused on my acting career.
I have had a very physical acting career, but on 'Newsroom,' it's not about physicality, but it's about presence. I get to just be. Strong, sensitive, quiet strength can be much more intimidating than the screaming loud guy, and I'm so glad to get to show this side of me, which, to be honest, is a lot like who I really am.
I said, going into acting, 'I'm never moving to L.A.,' because it scared me. But there was no way you could build an acting career in Orange County.
I might retire when acting becomes too hard on me physically, but I don't want to give up easily. I really want to have a long-term acting career.
I got so far away from what they told you in acting class: Do something different. Producers kept offering me the 'Sister Act' movie, but I said, 'My fans don't want to see me in a wimple.' I literally said, 'My fans don't want to see me in a wimple.'
As a kid, I was really into performing. I would do choruses, I would do musicals, whatever it was. And then, as a teenager, I got into an acting class at SUNY Purchase for gifted kids, and that really turned me on to material beyond musicals, Sam Shepard, and Christopher Durang plays.
I moved in with a roommate who told me, 'Stay with me until you can afford rent. Don't give up.' People who supported me were like, 'If you don't have money for food, I'll cook you dinner. You don't have money for acting class? Let's get together and read lines.'
My first real kiss came when I was 10, and it was in an acting class. I had to do a scene from a movie where someone gets kissed under a tree, and I did not want to do it! But my acting partner wanted me to feel comfortable, so he bought a picnic basket with all these snacks. He made such an effort - and it was cute.
My first acting class was taught by a little known playwright, David Mamet, who then cast me in my first play, opposite John Malkovich.
I remember my first acting class: I was like, 'That's it.' If I know that I want to do something then I'm going to do it and there's no stopping me, whether it's if I want to take a movie part or don't, or eat sushi for lunch or don't. There's always a very clear goal. Once I figure out what I want that's it.
