We're always being told 'find your voice.' When I was younger, I never really knew what this meant. I used to worry a lot about voice, wondering if I had my own. But now I realize that the only way to find your voice is to use it. It's hardwired, built into you. Talk about the things you love. Your voice will follow.
I knew that's where I was going. I knew we were going to Italy. You couldn't make this movie in America at this price. I knew it was going to be big. I knew there was going to be a ship involved and that there was going to be a set as big as the ship. I thought, well, here we go. But I knew that was where he was headed. He had been going this way for some time. All directors, once they have some success, they want to spend a whole heck of a lot of money. (Something else can't hear.)
In Paris, I was really singing for the sake of living. But eventually people said, 'Keep going; you've got a great voice,' and I started having confidence in my voice all of a sudden. That's when I started creating my own music.
I knew the term Stepford Wife, and I knew what that meant. I never read the book, and I think before I started filming I watched the movie. I thought it was very dated.
I went from basically filming in my bedroom by myself, filming some funny videos, and then overnight, I switched into filming in some studios and some warehouses and family homes. I started filming with directors and producers and editors, and there were so many people in the room, so it was definitely weird.
As I aged and I got stronger artistically, I really started to value my voice in performance - my 'voice' meaning my body, my technique, and my style. Then I started to really feel that flower as well. That's when I started to feel like, 'Wow - now I understand what my beauty is.'
When I was talking a lot of trash, a lot of the guys knew that when I started getting serious was when I started getting a little bit quieter. If I started locking up somebody, then I'd start talking even more and I'd talk more aggressive. But once I stopped, they knew I was really serious.
I think when I started going to war zones and started covering humanitarian issues, it became a calling because I realized I had a voice, and I can give people without a voice a voice... and now it is something that sits inside of me every day.
You don't need to be seeing someone to be in love with her. You can have lost touch with her, she can have hurt you, even inexplicably. If you ever felt that you really knew her and that it was what you knew that you loved, and if you remember what it was you once knew, why is it so crazy to retain that love still?
I started singing for The Phantom in January, and we started filming in October and I sang all the way through to the next June. In fact, I was singing for about two months before I even knew I had the role.
A friend of mine, a poet, Rebecca Wolff recently said to me, "You know, your stories are really voice-driven," and I guess I knew that already, but it's so true that I can't get something going unless I can hear the voice.
It was a really strange way that I came into music. Once I gave voice to it, the pit of emotions that I guess I knew was inside of me for a long time, the stream never really stopped.
I started with ballet, and once I started to really like it, I got into more - I did jazz and tap, and then kept going.
I feel like everybody should just spread more love and positivity in the world. You know, positivity and love is what makes the world go around.
Once I started performing I knew that's what I wanted to do with my life. But you have to work really hard to be a performer.
But I'm pretty lucky with my voice. When I first started touring I went to see a woman to give me some coaching on how not to lose my voice. And she was just saying really your voice is a muscle so if you're using it all the time you should actually come back from tour with a stronger voice than you left with. And that's really how I find it.