I'm still shocked when people say, 'You haven't done a studio record in 20 years.' I try to make excuses for it, but the truth is I just wasn't with it.
There have been periods of my career that I haven't worked for a really long time, like seven or eight months.
When 'MADtv' got cancelled, I didn't work at all - for three years.
When I rejoined AC/DC in 1994 I hadn't played for about eight years.
For seven years I did very little theatre, and I have to make up some time.
You can't not do stand-up for seven years and then not expect anyone else to come along. That's life, things move on.
I basically took six or seven years off, but then I had another five or four of me not working at all because I was in school. It was really 13 years of me not working at all... I really couldn't even think about it.
I've supported myself by writing since 1992, and I'm probably very nearly unemployable by now because employers are likely to be put off by the long gap.
I had toured so much in the 1960s and 1970s that I wanted a break. I didn't go back touring until 1995.
Well, these days, if you're away five years, you might not be able to get back.
For a decade, I was a stay-at-home mom. I sent my husband to his law office, sat on PTA boards and baked cookies - great cookies. All of a sudden, I had no husband, no job, few prospects, and two small children who had grown accustomed to eating.
The last time I had a job that wasn't an acting job was '88, and I'm quite proud of that.
