Without my women friends, I wouldn't know anything. They've been my teachers and my mothers. My mother was a wonderful person, but she didn't give me a lot of the stuff I needed to advance myself as an adult woman. I have a really strong group of girlfriends, and we share a lot with one another - the complications of raising children, marriages, personal and physical struggles.
I've been really fortunate to work with a lot of women.
I think that we're in a really amazing time, where there are really a lot of really fantastic female actresses and comedians. I imagine there's just a lot of opportunity for women to have powerful roles. Or it's just that there's more women writing TV. Women tend to maybe write strong women.
I know that a lot of feminist fears about the trans movement have been, "Wait, we never got to the part where we focus on women! We tried for a minute, but we don't want to lose the category all of a sudden. We haven't heard yet from the females with children called mothers, we haven't heard yet from all these groups!" On the one hand I'm very sympathetic to that, but the category of Women or Mothers, any of these categories, are on shifting sands and always have been.
Women are blessed with energy - a power which is unique. I have been very fortunate to have played strong women and explored their strengths through my films.
I worked with women who were nurses and workers, women who worked in hotels, janitors who basically cleaned buildings, worked two jobs just to support their family. And, it really taught me a lot about how much opportunity I had to do anything I wanted to with my life.
I worked on the line, I've been an executive chef, I've worked for the Mets, I've worked for various steakhouses, vegetarian restaurants, a lot of Middle Eastern stuff. I've worked my fair share of a lot of different things. I've worked at festivals and street fairs, you know? I've been through it all.
I have worked really hard on my game, but I think my mother has been a real pillar of strength. She has prayed a lot, sacrificed a lot for me. You know, she hasn't seen me bat so far. When I am batting, she is praying... mothers are like that, aren't they?
America is really tough on mothers, especially going to work again. A lot of women have to breast-pump, and they can't do that at work, and they only have two weeks' maternity leave. I'm very lucky that I get to pick and choose. And it helps that all my agents are women, and very protective of me. But for other working mothers here, support from their employers is not good enough. It shouldn't even be an issue. It's really important to be able to raise your kid without a fear of losing your job.
I seem to be getting a lot of things pushed my way that are strong women. It's like people see Hackers and they send me offers to play tough women with guns, the kind who wear no bra and a little tank top. I'd like to play strong women who are also very feminine.
I noticed in the past, a lot of guys who like strong women, they really freak out if you're not strong 24/7. Or they complain about you being strong, then the moment you're not strong, they're like, 'Oh, no, no, no.'
My gender has never been an issue or a limitation. I was fortunate enough to be surrounded by strong women growing up, and with them as my role models, I was never limited by the traditional roles women find themselves in.
You know, there's nothing damnable about being a strong woman. The world needs strong women. There are a lot of strong women you do not see who are guiding, helping, mothering strong men. They want to remain unseen. It's kind of nice to be able to play a strong woman who is seen.
Prior to working for Fox, I worked for ABC and NBC, spent a lot of time at CNN, and almost ended up at CBS. I worked for a bunch of local stations in Los Angeles and had a talk-radio show at KABC for six years. In other words, I'm fortunate enough to have been around, and Fox News is the best place I've ever worked.
I grew up with all mothers, all women. I come from a long line of matriarchs, very strong women.
One cannot understand what's happening to women in the Middle East if they don't realize that the mothers are a strong, progressive force. The mothers push the daughters to get out of the harem, to get the education, to achieve what they could not even dream of.