I hope that doing truthful portrayals of people in a variety of circumstances gives people a kind of subterranean link to those characters.

I wanted to do something far from my intellectual and physical home, so I went to live in Beijing for eight months and took Mandarin Chinese.

We all struggle with our failure to communicate and our failure to reach beyond fear to love people.

I try to become more humble and more myself with every year. There was a while when I got famous where I was so confused and my head was spinning.

I assume that if people get to know me, they'll like me. If they don't, it's not my problem.

My major in college was Chinese Studies. It was very intentional.

I could have seen myself going into academia, but I don't love it; I just like it.

I want my life to effect the balance to the positive.

The Oscars have become such a big deal these days that it's just used as adjective.

When I was 5, my mother threw a party, and a friend and I wrote and performed a play called The Dutch Doll.

There are all kinds of other things I could do, things I would probably like, but only acting would give me emotional fulfillment.

In the midst of the storm, my only anchor is the Saviour.

Loyalty, respect for authority and some degree of sanctification create a more binding social order that places some limits on individualism and egoism.

That is part of the beauty of all literature. You discover that your longings are universal longings, that you're not lonely and isolated from anyone. You belong.

There are more than one universe, and its inhabitants.

Let us be guardians, not gardeners

Democrats are firm believers in the welfare state for their own constituents, whether that's a crack addict mother of five or a Wall Street banker.

I remember when the idea of living to be 40 seemed absurd.

I am more comfortable doing a drama.

I want to be a vehicle to help people connect the dots that let them make their lives healthier, happier, more beautiful, and more fun.

I want people to flourish. I want them to walk away from the experience going, "That's what it should be like."