Time travel is a fantasy we all have. The 'Back to the Future' series really exploits that wish.

I was a slow starter. I didn't really make any dazzling impressions. But I don't really regret that because I learned a lot along the way. I always kept busy - I found my way my way, and I'm happy about it.

I don't like to repeat myself.

A picador is the guy in a bullfight who helps make sure the matador doesn't get killed by distracting the bull. That's what TV writing is. You're just distracting the bull long enough to stick around for the next set of commercials.

In point of fact, I'm not sure there are too many comedies with laugh tracks anymore. Most of what you hear is live studio audience laughing as a show is filmed. If this prompts you to wonder who those actual human beings are who are laughing at some of this stuff, that is a mystification I share.

I'm persistent. In the early '60s, when I first started making the rounds in New York for theater work, I became more and more enraged every time I had an interview or audition that went nowhere, and became more determined. I haven't lost that.

We live in an era now where every episode is reviewed 80 different times on the Internet by periodicals you've never even heard of.

A sign that negotiations were handled well on both sides is that everybody probably feels a little bit like they didn't get what they wanted.

I enjoy doing complicated or peculiar people.

I've always been fascinated by real scientists - Albert Einstein, Isaac Newton, and so many others - how they've come up with solutions to very complicated problems that nobody else can seem to figure out.

I had an attitude about some work, like television sitcoms. It was selling your soul.

I feel that I have been very fortunate and had the opportunity to play some wonderful roles and movies and worked with some great talent.

I find it difficult to work if I don't know the lines, you know, and not just knowing - they're second nature to me. Then, whatever happens in the performance when you're actually doing it, you're not going to go off. You're going to retain all of that. So I like to have my lines.

I don't know exactly how I end up with some of these roles. It mystifies me sometimes, but I am a fan of sci-fi. I love being taken into a strange world, and when it's told with imagination and credibility, I love being taken on that trip. I always have.

I loved doing Judge Doom in 'Who Framed Roger Rabbit.' I'm constantly running into people who saw that movie when they were kids, and it absolutely horrified them.

A lot of things you just stumble into: relationships or ways of putting characters opposite one another that really worked. So then it's not always so much about imitating other people, but imitating yourself, at least in your thinking.

I tend to avoid things like award shows and panels and interviews, not remotely because I feel I'm above them or wish to cultivate the image of the intriguing recluse. I'm just not very good at them.

On 'Frasier,' a network executive once suggested that one week we have John Lithgow play Frasier and Kelsey Grammar play Lithgow's role on '3rd Rock From the Sun;' I've been deeply afraid of the idea of a crossover ever since.

There is certainly a higher percentage of wit in British comedy than in American comedy. What always tickles me is the way in which people try to use their intellect to get themselves out of tricky situations but never quite manage to do so - much to their enormous embarrassment.

I like being busy.

I've worked a lot with kids before. They can be very, very difficult, just because they're kids.

I turned down a film that was offered to me in the very early '80s, a Scorsese film. That probably wasn't a good career move.

Eric Stoltz was a very good actor.

I'm often asked, 'What was, for you, your greatest film experience?' And it always comes back to 'One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest,' aside from being a film that really handled subject matter in such a brilliant, brilliant way.

'Hamlet' was the first movie I saw. In 1948, my mother said, 'I'm going to take you to see 'Hamlet' with Laurence Olivier.' She was worried about taking me to it because she wasn't sure I was old enough to understand it or to maybe be adversely affected by it, but I got recordings of it and memorized all the soliloquies.

Every role I get is always a challenge. I can read a script and say, 'Oh, I can do that!' and then when I start working on it, I suddenly realize that I had no idea what I was getting into. Then I have to really work hard!

'Cuckoo's Nest' was my first film, and I had wanted to do film for some time, but somehow I had not clicked. I would go in for interviews or readings, and I never had the sense that I was anywhere near what they were looking for.

I was already committed to a play back in New York about Hans Christian Andersen, where Colleen Dewhurst was going to play my mother. I was excited about that, and I got this script called 'Back to the Future,' and I thumbed through it. Didn't pay a hell of a lot of attention.

'Cuckoo's Nest' came along, and I was cast, and that was great, but it was my first film, so I felt like I was kind of walking around on the set as Walk-On A.

I'm not too picky. I'm not waiting, sitting around for the ideal and perfect role. I like to work, so I try to make the best of whatever opportunity comes up.

As long as I can keep remembering the lines and getting to the locations, I want to keep working as long as I can. I love it.

Some people have quick retention. I'm not one of those.

The time and preparation before a play is something I really value, and it's something I learned in New York.

I guess nobody can teach you the knack, or whatever it is, that helps you come to life on stage.

I didn't know where my career was going to go. Somehow, people sensed that I have certain talents and cast me in these bizarre, off-beat roles, which I have no regret about. I've enjoyed playing every one of them.

I don't know if there are too many other trilogies with stories that have continued to captivate audiences like 'Back to the Future' has.

The film I had the most fun in was 'Back to the Future Part III.' It had horseback riding, and all that work, all that training, was quite an experience.

We were all such odd characters, even though we were a really functional family, in a way, as eccentric and crazy as we were. And it was such a wonderful feeling amongst us of being a family almost. We were 'The Addams Family!'

I grew up on Charles Addams' cartoons, particularly 'The Addams Family,' and Uncle Fester was always one of my favorites.

I really enjoy playing villains, whether they're realistic like Switchblade Sam or whether they're a bit more over-the-top like Kruge in 'Star Trek III' or Judge Doom in 'Who Framed Roger Rabbit.' It's sort of a license just to be as bad as the script allows you to be - you can just go for it and have fun.

Over the years, I have attended comic book conventions and met people that are die-hard fans; they'll come up and say, 'Clue' is my favorite movie of all time.' It has definitely resonated in some way with people and just continued to build up over the years considerably.

'Star Trek' came along fairly early. And I don't know what they saw in me that said Captain Kruge, because I hadn't done anything remotely like that, but it worked out.

I was just very shy. I was never anxious to do talk shows, as I didn't know what to say. And I don't feel I have any inherent interest. But as I'm getting older, I feel I want to be able to share whatever I know if it means something to someone.

I got a few speeding tickets when I was young, but I'm a little more like the turtle than the hare.

Whether it's a very dramatic part or a comical role, I feel I need to create the same thing: a full-fledged, three-dimensional character that the audience can identify with.

I meet people on the street who literally chose their careers because they saw 'Back to the Future' and decided they wanted to be scientists or astronomers or engineers.

In a way, theatre is still my first love.

There were a couple times with close-ups where I tended to overact. I would use more of my face than I needed to. I learned how to be more subtle.

I had told my agents that I didn't want to do television. I can't believe I had that gall, looking back on it. I would never condescend to do TV, and then 'Taxi' called up for a guest spot in the first season. And my common sense kind of took over, I guess.

In New York theater, you always talk about wanting a great ensemble of actors.