People don't realise what a nice thing it is for an actor to go to a job where they know or like everybody, because you're so often having to do new beginnings, starting off on set with people you don't know, having to introduce yourself and make friends.

Acting is about enhancing your life, not representing something that's missing.

When I was at school studying biology, I wanted to be a medical researcher. I did work experience at St Mary's Hospital in London, and I begged them to let me see the post mortems. So the first time I saw a naked male was at 15, when I saw an 89 year old man who had died of a brain hemorrhage.

Carol Burnett, who played Miss Hannigan in 'Annie', is as funny as it gets.

My mother's family was among the 120,000 people of Japanese descent on the West Coast who were dispatched to internment camps during World War II.

My dogs are more important than my family.

Winning the 2007 Master's was a dream fulfilled; culminating on Easter Sunday with my family was very special. You couldn't write it up any better.

Now that it's officially summer, here's my advice to parents who want to continue teaching their kids during the next two months and learn something themselves: visit Civil War battlefields.