I'm not sad about any of my life. It's so unconventional. It doesn't look anything like I thought it would.

Obviously, it wasn't meant for me to die of cancer at 40. Every day my life surprises me, just like my cancer diagnosis surprised me. But you roll with it. That's our job as humans.

The common misconception is that as an actress you have to learn what you're doing. No, you just have to make the audience think you've learned it.

I'm an old-school, embarrassing Joni Mitchell fan. Her music made a hook in my soul and hasn't let go for all these years. I even sing her songs as lullabies to my kids.

I don't have examples in my life of people who are all good or bad; I have deeply loved many people who are both, and I relate to those kinds of people on a far greater level.

But I've always been hard to cast, I've never been an ingenue, I've never been the romantic lead. I'm an actor; give me the script and I do what I do and hope it's good.

I was a young kid from Long Island who wanted to do something large with her life, so I can relate to that.

I've never been all that interested or aware of what people are thinking about me or saying about me. I think that has kept me safest and sanest.

One of the ways I think I gain fodder for characters is by watching people.

I sort of love reading the scripts and going, 'Oh wow, what a great idea. I never would have thought of that.

All I ever wanted to do was act. And pay my bills

Certain levels of human understanding cannot be attained, it is claimed, until the brain can work in more than one way.

You are hurrying to the sweet place, To the nonsense chasing your spirit And in the nonsense you look for answers.

The popular idea that a child forgets easily is not an accurate one. Many people go right through life in the grip of an idea which has been impressed on them in very tender years.

Good strategy, keep the conversation going until a guard notices the bodies outside the door. Maybe burst in to save you. Not a bad idea.

Liberty requires security without intrusion, security plus privacy.

I don't read books, but I have friends who do.

The psychology degree is simply that I was a chemistry major, and they kept wanting the correct answer, whereas in psychology you basically write whatever you want, and chances are you get a B.

I wanted to do everything. I wanted to be a pilot. I wanted to be a secret agent. I wanted to be a fireman and a doctor, all that. So I related that through movies and stuff.

I persuaded him to throw the dirk away; and it was as easy as persuading a child to give up some bright fresh new way of killing itself.

I'm surfing the giant life wave.