Starting out, I bet I didn’t get a lot of parts because of my strange voice. I’m not consciously thinking, ‘Hey, sound like a squeaky dog toy mixed with a bagful of rusty nails.’ It’s just what my voice has done.
You’re happy that people are seeing your work. As for the critics, it really hurts when they knock you.
I think I, like most people, enjoy a wide variety of music. Yeah, I like some country stuff – old country stuff. I might not enjoy Billy Ray Cyrus or anything. But, you know, Patsy Cline, Willie Nelson, early Johnny Cash – absolutely.
I always was a funny guy, the class clown. I had a very funny dad and an extremely funny grandmother.
I think we’re all guilty of mistaking the actors we’ve seen over and over again – we think we know them.
I think people are surprised when I string two sentences together. But I had a fiercely academic upbringing.
In my theater days I assumed that you had to get rid of yourself to do a character well, and I don’t think I was a very good actor when I did that.
I had my own insecurities, which a lot of my comedy would come from, about not being able to live up to their academic expectations. Acting out those insecurities was a way of confronting them, like, “Let me just lean into being a guy who can’t read or write.”
As an actor, I think every moment in your life is giving you a new set of tools. You’re constantly absorbing new information that you can put back onto the screen.
It doesn’t really matter to me whether the 7-year-olds are big fans of my work. I’m happy just to be working at all. I do think it will be nice to have a movie that my son can watch.
I went to college to be a jock and to play on the baseball team. And then, I got cut and realized that that was it for that. I was really small. The other guys were really big, on that team. I was a bit of a theater nerd, and I was an art history major.
I was the world’s smallest man, covered in freckles with a squeaky, scratchy voice. And I still am, but I’ve learned to love myself.
Occasionally it can be a little disappointing to see rock gods in their 60s or 70s up on stage.
I’m always in the elements, it seems like it’s pouring rain on me a lot and there’s crowds of people pushing me around, and it feels very real. Which is great as a actor, you don’t have to come up with too much of it. I’m always amazed.
I always have my best thoughts on the toilet.
You’re responsible for your own character to a degree, because when it comes to the final draft of the script, you might say, “Well, I think maybe I could add this here, add that there.” But I find that I write just as well for the other characters as I do for myself. I think.
I find that the majority of the year, I don’t spend acting. I spend it either writing or editing or producing, or putting things together. So it’s as shocking as it is tragic. I really enjoy it. It’s a valuable skill set. I certainly feel like more of a grownup.
There are certain episodes that on the page I thought, “Oh boy, this is going to be the funniest episode.” And there are other ones that went in, fingers crossed, saying, “Oh well, let’s hope something good comes out of it.” Oftentimes, those ones wind up being the best ones.
Everyone feels like an underdog, at some point in their life. Even the best-looking people and the most athletic probably have a phase in their life – a year or two – where they’re awkward or they have braces.
Everyone knows what it’s like to feel like the underdog. Everyone wants to be accepted. Ultimately, everybody wants to be loved.
I didn’t know that it was going to launch a quote-unquote comedic career. I just wanted to do anything other than wait tables.