Nevertheless

Once you've found some joy, you never want to be without it.

It is imperative that we replace those who think they own this country, with those who built it.

I believe that things change only when we are truly ready for the change. We come to a situation or event that could be a great turning point in our lives having been prepared by both adversity and hope. And then, if you let it, the future just opens like a flower,

Once you abandon your instincts and begin polling people people about your choices, once you attempt to reshape yourself into some you are not, it affects nearly every decision you make

there was nothing to be ashamed of in doing jobs simply to make a living, so long as those jobs fueled other creative efforts

...alcohol drowns our dreams, silences our beliefs, and relieves us of our responsibilities...

[Alec asked his agent John Burnham at William Morris if he was being shunned by Hollywood execs] 'It's not that when they think of you they hate you. They don't think of you at all.

[Tennessee] William's writing has the effect that all great writing has on an actor. It steadies you. It emboldens you You ride an elevator to the top floor of a building, you jump off the penthouse balcony, and you fly. Just put one foot in front of the other, one line after the other, one moment after the other, and you are walking on air. It was the creative experience of a lifetime. (playing Stanley in Streetcar Named Desire)

On a movie set, the cry is 'Back to one!' to alert the cast and extras to reset to their original positions before the camera is rolled for the next take. Whenever I arrived at a place where the film business felt uncomfortable or downright unsafe for me, the place I often returned to was the theater. Onstage, we trust the material works, we assume all the actors are genuinely talented, and the work itself is the focus, unencumbered by the bullshit that often interferes with moviemaking. Back to one indeed.

In the beginning, I had thought I might try acting for a while and see if it fit. As the work I was offered became more interesting it became my life. The challenge of doing it well at an ever-higher level appealed to me more than anything else.

Quoting Julie Harris: I don't wish for anything to be over. To wish something to be over is to wish your life to be over.

High school was a blur of wanting things I couldn’t have and missing the wonderful moments right in front of me.

[About his pivot from George Washington University to New York University.] Then based solely on Shari's (a friend of a girlfriend) playful provocation, I auditioned for the theater program at NYU. ... This was an idiotic idea, all things considered. When I eventually pitched it to my parents on the phone, my mother shrieked what a mistake I was making. My dad just listened. ... {H]e said to my mother, 'Let's here him out.' I knew something other than money was behind that. Here was a man who had short-circuited his own dreams in order to provide for his family. 'You'll never be young enough to do this again,' he said.