Of the many horrors of divorce, the most egregious is that it robs a kid of the best of both worlds. Dads can do many things that even the best moms can't, and vice versa.

After my parents' divorce when I was 4, I spent weekends with my dad before we finally moved to California. By the time Sunday rolled around, I was incapable of enjoying the day's activities, of being in the moment, because I was already dreading the inevitable goodbye of Sunday evening.

I love anything by Joan Didion. Incidentally, she was one of the local moms when I was growing up in Point Dume. She always reminded me a little bit of my mother, so I feel a great affinity. I love the precision of Didion's writing. There's a construction and a craftsmanship to her sentences that's imbued with so much emotion.

For sure, without question, the writing is better on TV pound for pound than movies because the businesses have changed so much. So all the great writers would rather work for TV, and they do.

I've always been involved in politics, since I was 8 or 9 years old. I sold Kool-Aid for McGovern - I could always pick a winner.

Can we understand - just for the record, we do need the government for a lot of big ticket items.

I sadly never got to my prom. I was shooting 'The Outsiders.'

Sampling, statisticians have told us, is a much more effective way of getting a good census.

Tom Ford, who is my all-time favourite, once said to me, 'Here's the thing about dress shirts, Rob. You need white, and you need black.' 'What about blue,' I asked. He said, 'Have you ever seen Cary Grant in a blue dress shirt?'

Things that I consider bad qualities, I always try and figure out where they are coming from. I don't consider ambition to be a bad one. It's served me very well in my life. Very well.

One of the interesting things about Twitter is looking how famous people choose to use it. Take someone like Steve Martin, who I follow: it's all sorts of comic gems, nothing private, nothing personal - all jokes. Other celebrities are overtly personal - like Charlie Sheen. I do a mix of observations and updates.

My greatest regret at the passing of America-hating strongman Hugo Chavez is that he didn't live long enough to party with Dennis Rodman.

The Kennedys are our royals.

If you are worried about what people think of you, you should go into politics. Real actors take chances.

I'm a sportsman, you know, and I shoot skeet, and I grew up in the Midwest, so that's a part of my culture.

Getting married isn't going to make your relationship better. It's just a ceremony.

I like doing things that are different, unexpected, and where I feel that either the role feels like a natural fit for me or it's a really big swing that I don't know if I'm going to connect on.

I love London.

I'm perfectly flawed... I've got tons of flaws.

Sobriety was the greatest gift I ever gave myself. I don't put it on a platform. I don't campaign about it. It's just something that works for me. It enabled me to really connect with another human being - my wife, Sheryl - which I was never able to do before.

I have had a lot of blessed, interesting things happen to me and have bumped up against some amazing people.

I've never met a funny person who wasn't smart. I've met a lot of dramatic people who were stupid. But I've never met a funny person who wasn't smart.

The first private space of my own wasn't a dorm room; it was a hotel room in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

I look at it like this: that if Shakespeare were alive today, he would have written two or three plays about the Kennedy family, and actors would traditionally play JFK like they Hamlet or King Lear. They just would. I mean, people have played JFK, and they'll play him long after I have.

Being in a successful marriage is no different than being cast in a successful movie. It's all about who you pick; in that first moment, did you pick the right person? I think you need to pick somebody who's more interested in being married than in getting married.

If I had been on 'Ally McBeal,' I would have been seen coming out of the shower on the first show.

I didn't go to Ivy League schools. I dropped out of college to go into movies.

In comedy you have to be willing to not take yourself seriously, you know? I take comedy really seriously, and so to take comedy seriously, you must not, you cannot, ever take yourself seriously.

I never get bored talking about themes dealing with ambition, leadership and what it means to be an American. I love that stuff. I just love it. I've loved it ever since I was on 'The West Wing.'

I wish I was a more religious person. I really admire Martin Sheen for his Catholicism. It's such a bedrock. I wish I had that in my life.

Oh my God, I love rehab! I highly recommend it.

My roles in comedies from 'Austin Powers' to 'Tommy Boy' to 'Wayne's World,' were sort of comedic 'straight man' parts. My character on 'Parks & Recreation' is the comic relief in a comedy. To play a character that appears strictly for laughs is sort of new for me and really fun.

I started out being a really, really liberal Democrat.

It's a little bit of a 'if you can't beat 'em - join 'em' mentality for me when I think about Twitter.

I'm a true centrist: my beliefs put me in the middle... You know what happens to people who drive in the middle of the road? They get run over.

If you treat China like a foe, surely she will become one.

My dad is an attorney. I've always been interested in it. My sons are probably going to law school.

When I started on 'The West Wing,' that was at a time when this was still a stigma, because movie stars didn't do TV. Now, every movie star is desperate to find their 'True Detective.'

I have other obligations now - the show, my family, my life... though I know that without my sobriety I wouldn't have any of those things.

Somewhere in my callow, misspent youth, I was smart enough to marry my best friend.

I've said before that the common perception that all good actors should be good liars is exactly the opposite; only bad actors lie when they act.

Belonging to one party is acceptable. But my days of just ticking the party box are long over. I judge the candidates for who they are.

To go from playing Jack Startz in 'Behind the Candelabra' to playing JFK in the same year, I have now operated at the far ends of my range as an actor.

Temperamentally, Sam and I are very much alike. He's a lawyer, my father's a lawyer, and I always wanted to play one. On so many levels the role just felt right. I fell in love with it as I would a woman.

I couldn't have gotten sober without rehab because I needed the science.

I had long ago become a creation, a public image made to be consumed, piled on top of a precarious shell of a little boy wanting to be loved.

If you're telling a story, and somebody is going to come out badly, it better be you.

The term 'celebrity memoir' has gotten such a bad name now, but there used to be a little bit of an art form to it.

Directors are not worried about casting beautiful women, but they are not sure that they want to cast great-looking men. My looks have prevented people from seeing my work.

I have, on the other hand, felt ill will from various people in the industry and the press.