Engineering is a fantastic base for any career.

What you learn at university is a good discipline but has little relevance to a real job.

I've always found diversity more interesting than specialisation. I like mixing it up across years, within days, within weeks - that's what stimulates me, gives me energy.

I switch on and off very easily; I'm inherently lucky in that sense. I sleep well.

When political correctness first started coming around, it ruined Andrew Dice Clay and Eddie Murphy's stand-up career. Sam Kinison died at just the right time, 'cause no one was going to tolerate what he was saying anymore either.

The effect of prizes on one's career - if that is what to call it - is considerable, since they give one more clout with publishers and more notoriety among journalists. The effect on one's writing, however, is nil - otherwise, one would be in deep trouble.

The Internet represented a really important tool that would be used by every business out there to some extent. But for the vast majority of companies to say, 'We're an Internet company,' is a little bit like saying, 'We're a fax company because we have a fax machine.'

I am kind of a private person, so I don't miss that part of show business at all. Looking back on my career in television and making a movie like 'The Sound of Music' from an adult point of view, it actually seems kind of unreal. I was involved in shows that people grew up with - that hold memories for them - and it's a cool feeling.