I always find something in common with my protagonist, particularly when I write in the first person.
I'm conflicted with theater in the city because you want to reach a diverse audience, and that audience doesn't typically go to the theater.
Acting is really about having the courage to fail in front of people.
At the end of whatever we're doing, I always feel like I want to go back and start over again because now I have a better sense of what it is. I feel that with everything. Like, if you're doing like a long run of a play and you're doing it seven shows a week, at the end of it, I want to go back and start from the beginning.
The only thing I know that makes me feel comfortable is to know as much as I can. Not like what the shots are going to be, but knowing enough about my character that I can forget those things. And more specifically, my lines. I have to know my lines. I have to know something really well, so I can forget it when we're doing it. And there is comfort in knowing, "Okay, there's not another stone that I could have overturned. "
In the military, you learn the essence of people. You see so many examples of self-sacrifice and moral courage. In the rest of life you don't get that many opportunities to be sure of your friends.
I always think back to the original movies and to those quieter moments where Luke is out in A New Hope, and there are the two suns setting. It is the equivalent, basically, of a farm boy dying to get out of his small town and do something bigger. It's those kinds of universal themes that ground this whole thing in space.
I lowered the gun but didn’t holster it. Not just yet. She could turn out to be psychotic. Or a door-to-door salesperson.
One of the blessings and curses of my life is that I carry so many projects at the same time.
That's life. We all go through the tractor blades now and then. We all get bruised, and we all get cut. Sometimes the blade cuts deep. The lucky ones come through with a few scratches, a little blood, but even that isn't the most important thing. The most important thing is having someone there to scoop you up, to hold you tight, and to tell you everything is all right.
When you translate the Bible with excessive literalism, you demythologize it. The possibility of a convincing reference to the individual's own spiritual experience is lost. (111)