I was spending three days literally just kibitzing with Jack Nicholson at a table! It was heaven! And talk about a normal guy. My God, he was just so real and cool and relaxed and fun. And he was a great performer. He's such an actor. He really was so focused on every moment. It was great.
People would stop me in the street - my demographic tends to be the elderly Jewish women from Miami; I think they tend to fancy me as someone that would've been good with their daughter or something - and a lot of them will do the wrist-slapping thing. "Oh, you're a terrible man! Just terrible!" And I'm, like, "Well, it's just a show. I'm just playing a character."
If you do an episode about something like transverse myelitis, it's a real disease that's out there, there are a lot of people that have it, and it's hard to get funding for them because people don't know about it. There are actually a lot of doctors that don't know about it. But if you do an episode of House, all of a sudden 15 million people are hearing the words, and it's an opportunity.
Why things get canceled or not is so unbelievably out of actors' hands that it's one of those things where you've just got to ride with it.
Every actor wants to know in different ways. Some like to know everything. Some don't want to know anything. I think I land somewhere in the middle.
You never get tired of making money, and you never get tired of a great acting gig, a same role that you can play for years, with wonderful writing and wonderful actors.
In terms of what's going to actually happen to me in the story, down towards the end of the season, I'm dying to know, but I just don't ask. If it's something that I think will really affect how I play it and it's information I need to know, than I'll ask, for sure.
If it's a good role, I'm happy to play it.
I've never done real sci-fi. I've never played an alien. I've never played some sort of superhero. Which I'd love to do!
I'm frankly shocked that Hollywood hasn't called me to do a superhero.
My first film role was a reporter. It's funny, because my father was a news reporter. I always thought there was something strange about that.
I always loved doing productions in school. In college, I started getting a little more serious.
I really had spent my whole life playing soccer, and the fact that I was willing to give that up for theater, that told me I was moving in that direction.
Maybe I'm just lucky I'm not working with any assholes... yet.
I can play a Jewish guy, another Jewish guy, and then another Jewish guy, and then maybe a Cuban guy. Or at least a Middle Eastern guy. But for me, they're all Jews.
Woody Allen, that was a dream come true, although I never really talked to him. Auditioning was fun, because you don't really hear much about the script. They just said, "They want a Woody Allen type," so of course I got the call.
I'm a huge, huge sports fan. A massive sports fan.
I'm always an agent or a lawyer or a doctor or a banker. I'm always wearing a tie.
I was a greasy short-order cook. I just liked being greasy! That was a real departure for me.
Bradley Cooper was an asshole, but he was - like Sidney Lumet, like George Clooney - the nicest guy in the world. I sound like the biggest ass-kisser ever. But I'm telling the truth, I swear to God!
Being able to play a role where you're there almost every day and you're just in it... I remember it was a whirlwind, but it was a lot of fun.
I sat next to Robert Duvall at the lawyers' table for six weeks, and it's still probably the best six weeks of my life.
Everybody else, they're wonderful, but [Robert] Duvall sets the tone for all of cinema acting. So just to be in his space was amazing.
We walked out of this library building downtown, just on our way to lunch, and I was walking a few steps behind Travolta, and when he opened the door, it was as if Jesus had just walked out into the commons.
Steve Zaillian is just the sweetest. A very, very wonderful and interesting director.
