Everybody who's anybody has been competitive and over-sensitive and a bit silly. Look at Paul McCartney, look at Elton John. They're jealous of Justin Timberlake. I'm sure they were jealous of me when I was in my imperial phase.
I've always been searching to arrive at a certain voice that will probably elude me forever.
The sense of one's past is so strong and forms our sense of self so strongly, it will always fascinate, elude and confuse me.
I'm not a man deeply interested in technology. It eludes me.
Why something in the public interest such as television news can be fought over, like a chain of hamburger stands, eludes me.
I'm a happy camper when I'm doing both: writing and art every day, along with a dose of reading and adventures into what else is being done by other artists/writers and poets. Like breathing. I've written poems or fictions to go with a painting. The source for the inspiration of the art often eludes me.
For centuries, economic thinkers, from Adam Smith to John Maynard Keynes, have tried to identify the elusive formula that makes some countries more prosperous and successful than others. My curiosity about this topic spurred me, as a young professor of economics in the late 1970s, to research new ways of measuring national competitiveness.
When you play the king of elves and alien warlords, little me is very uninteresting. But, at the same time, actors feel this obligation to be transparent, and I truly don't understand the point.
I'd have to say, for me, as a child, my favorite memories were always centered around Christmas time. It always seemed like no matter how much money my parents had or didn't have, we got completely spoiled rotten. There were always presents under the tree, and we always did special things, like hide elves around the house.
It was Elvis who really got me hooked on beat music. When I heard 'Heartbreak Hotel' I thought, this is it.
When I met Elvis, we didn't really have a conversation. I was introduced by my uncle, and he sort of grunted my way. What stays with me is the whole scene. I had never seen a real mob scene before. I was really young and impressionable. Elvis really did look - he looked sort of not real, as if he were glowing.
To me, John Lennon and Elvis Presley were punks, because they made music that evoked those emotions in people.
I love Jimi Hendrix obviously, and Jimmy Page and Prince. And also Elvis Presley is a really great guitar player. I don't think he ever took lessons; he was piecing it together himself. But he has great rhythm. And rhythm, to me, you can use it to your advantage if you're not all over the fretboard.
The first record I ever listened to was Elvis Presley, and I remember thinking, 'Man this guy is cool!' The swagger he had really helped my confidence, because he really made me think that a white boy could make music like this.
My daughter emails me. When your daughter starts to email you instead of talk to you... It's horrible. You cannot forget human communication.
You'd be surprised how many kids and young people come to the website and send me email that they are actually going into the Marine Corp because of something that I said or did.
I'm stunned at the amount of young women who get in touch with me every single day, trying to become somebody like me. As a teenager, I would never have done that. And I was someone who was interested in politics. But I wouldn't have emailed the local MP.
We barely had cell phones on '90210.' It started in the '90s. That's pretty much when fax machines came into play. When I first got the script for '90210' I had to come into New York to get it. It was not emailed to me; there was no email.
A lady emailed me that her child had been diagnosed with autism and that hearing my material on the subject had helped her. To me, it just means that I'm making the right decision in talking about this.
For a fortnight nobody at all emailed me, or posted a follow-up. Doesn't anyone care, I thought? It turned out my newsreader was broken, and hadn't posted at all.
