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.
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 grew up as a tomboy. I was always barefoot, running races with the guys on the block, climbing trees, and beating kids up.
Addiction has had such an impact on my life and the people I love, and there really is not a lot about it that is funny. So the last thing I wanted was to give the impression that it’s all fun and games, and isn’t it funny what she gets away with.
I was a young kid from Long Island who wanted to do something large with her life, so I can relate to that.
An addict is an addict. If they’re not acting out in one area, it tends to come out in another. I think there was a time when I considered myself a work addict, but that’s no longer accurate.