I can't believe how much time has passed. The first time I did stand-up I was 17, and I was really a stand-up once I was 19 in New York, and now I'm 41, and I still feel like I haven't found myself onstage.
I'm the best interviewer in the whole format. Except for Howard Stern, I'd put myself against anybody. Because I ask human questions.
The major poets of New Jersey have all suffered, whether it's Whitman, who lost his job for 'Leaves of Grass,' or William Carlos Williams, who was called a communist, or Ginsberg, whose 'Howl' was prosecuted, or myself. If you practise poetry the way I think it needs to be done, you're going to put yourself in jeopardy.
I want to show all sides of myself. I mean, I don't want to howl at the moon my whole life, you know?
I tend to get over-excited and very, very loud. I rein myself in when people flinch and dogs start howling.
In the end, censoring a comedian's jokes is on par with censoring 'Huckleberry Finn.' Now, I'm not comparing myself to Mark Twain - he had much wavier hair and a slightly thicker mustache. But when you deny an artist the chance to explore his art, you're forcing your beliefs on him.
I don't do a huge amount of physical activity. I play tennis, I work out sporadically, and I eat well and take care of myself.
I didn't know this about myself, but when 'Pirates of the Caribbean' came out I realised that I didn't enjoy a huge amount of recognition. I didn't react to it well, but I think life is about finding out who you are and what you like. So I started doing independent movies and art-house films instead.
If I can do something in less than one minute, I don't let myself procrastinate. I hang up my coat, put newspapers in the recycling, scan and toss a letter. Ever since I wrote about this rule in 'The Happiness Project,' I've been amazed by how many people have told me that it has made a huge difference in their lives.
Picasso's always been such a huge influence that I thought when I started the cartoon paintings that I was getting away from Picasso, and even my cartoons of Picasso were done almost to rid myself of his influence.
I couldn't be more proud of my little sister and the mother she is and am also incredibly proud of my mom and the huge influence she's had on myself, my sisters, and now her grandchildren.
Toni Collette has been a huge influence. She was my absolute number one idol, and then I got 'United States of Tara.' I was pinching myself. I couldn't believe the first day I was on set, and I got pages of dialogue of real stuff to do with her.
I guess I see a part of myself in everyone I write about. I tend to write about kids who are obsessed with something, and even though I have never been good with machines the way Hugo is, I did love miniature things when I was a kid.
If I was going to build a logical defense for myself in a match against Hulk Hogan, I think I would try to work on his legs. Take out any mobility.
When I moved to Hull and I was playing against players in the Premier League, maybe I pinched myself then.
As human beings, we aren't as individual as we'd like to believe we are. And I think that's what makes acting possible. Despite the fact that I have not experienced something, I have it in my human capacity to imagine it and to put myself in someone else's shoes, and to take someone else's circumstances personally.
I think quite spiritually of myself. I feel like I'm here to support the human evolution.
The whole conviction of my life now rests upon the belief that loneliness, far from being a rare and curious phenomenon, peculiar to myself and to a few other solitary men, is the central and inevitable fact of human existence.
I do, indeed, close my door at times and surrender myself to a book, but only because I can open the door again and see a human face looking at me.
For myself, I do not now know in any concrete human terms wherein my individuality consists. In my present human form of consciousness I simply cannot tell.
