I began thinking I would do musical theater because in high school that was really the only sort of curriculum they had as far as getting onstage and doing anything that anybody would see. So that's what I did.
I just used to go to the same auditions with all these other kids I went to school with. I didn't feel like I was really good at acting. I didn't feel like I was a really talented person that needed to be doing this.
I was constantly involved in music and theatre all through middle school and high school.
I was one of those people who watched and videotaped the Tonys every year and kept a highlight reel every year. I saw every Broadway show as a kid.
I knew I wanted to be a performer, but I didn't know I would specifically be in film. I actually never thought I would be in film. I always envisioned being on the stage.
I just had a throwaway part, really, if you think about it. I'm not a natural actor, you know? I'm a comedian, through and through. And I really love my lines. Those are the lines I want to do.
I was always a performer kid - like, annoyingly so. I would put on shows for my family and direct my friends in little plays, and my little sister, I'd make up dances with her. But when I was 12, that was when I started taking it seriously, and my mom for some reason believed in me and helped me find an agent in Cleveland, which did nothing for me.
The theater community will always remain a big part of my life, and I hope to re-join the cast of 'The Color Purple' at some point down the road.
The basic skill of an actor is, in fact, empathy, and that's maybe not a skill, it's a disposition. I am an assistant storyteller. I enjoy feeling useful to a team effort. It's my way of finding a use for myself, a utility in this world.
I wanted to be on Broadway, but in musical comedy.
I am an entertainer by all means, and I am going to always take stages and will fall on my face with those stages without a care because I am not afraid to fail.
I was in California, and I was going to UCLA, and I knew I certainly didn't have movie star looks. I remember seeing pictures and photos of Ethel Merman and Mary Martin, who were kind of average looking. I said, 'Well, that's for me, then, to go back to New York and try to be in musical comedy on Broadway.'
When I grew up in Cincinnati in 1974, the Board of Education set up the performing school, similar to the New York performing arts school, and it was in walking distance from my school.
My dream is to be on 'Saturday Night Live.' I'm going to do everything to make that happen.
We're not doing brain surgery. We're not saving lives... Even if you're doing Shakespeare, it's still entertainment. We're just entertaining people. We're just doing the stuff that comes on in between the ads.
Acting is just a job. I'm exactly the same as that lady bringing us coffee, and I have to remember that.
I'd done acting at a local drama school on Saturdays. I just enjoyed it. It never entered my mind I could possibly do it for a career.
I auditioned for 'American Sniper' and didn't get a role.
I love working in New York theater.
I grew up in Northern California, and theater is all there was. I didn't know how to go about starting a career when I was 10.
When I was a kid, I didn't know how I got into acting.
I mean, certainly writing, painting, photography, dance, architecture, there is an aspect of almost every art form that is useful and that merges into film in some way.
Fine arts education in public schools is really abysmal. The same emphasis should be put on music, theater, dance - anything creative - that's put on math and science.
Living in L.A., I was embarrassed to say that I wanted to be an actor.
When I went to university, I was a philosophy major, but because I'm not very bright I chose to study philosophy at a performing arts school, maybe because the philosophy program there wasn't too rigorous or challenging.
