There are directors who don't cast you for the way you act but for the way you are, the way you behave around the dinner table.

This is a grueling profession. Either you can't get work, or you can't get certain kinds of parts, or you get a part, and it kills you because it's not good enough, or you get successful and feel guilty about it.

I don't like to discuss my work in a lot of detail; I'm afraid of dissecting it in a way that is not good for me.

When you're doing a legitimate play, if you have a company of 12, it's considered a big cast.

'Taxi' made a big difference because it got me into comedy.

I was this extremely dramatic actress. And then, suddenly, I was doing comedy.

It's totally mystifying to me how anyone could have canceled 'Taxi.' I don't understand it because that stuff is rare.

I didn't decide to be a character actress.

Sometimes every single element of a character is a torturous discovery.

There is no restaurant anywhere in the world where I have been that I haven't been able to find something to eat.

I only eat things that you don't have to kill.

I make my relationships at work.

I have fun at work.

Work is the most nourishing thing so far in my life.

I don't like that I'm my own commodity, that I am what I sell.

The Oscar nomination made me a recognizable name to other actors and people in general.

I know I'll work, but not when or where. I never know what to pack.

I don't put together cars, I put together people.

And my first film was Carnal Knowledge, another amazing experience, largely because of Mike Nichols, who would tell me you can't do anything wrong because you're doing everything right.

People who are interested in the arts and theater are such a minority.

That's when the great stuff happens, when you're not checking yourself all the time, being critical of yourself and what other people are doing.

I don't feel that I have any great grasp of technique that I should pass along to people.

Acting is pretty much my whole life.

It's hard to regulate the speed at which you can achieve something creative and emotional.