I was the first person in the world to audition for 'The Hobbit'. The casting director told me that when I went in. That's a lot of pressure, isn't it? The first person in the world.
The whole atmosphere of the book, the tone of 'The Hobbit,' is of a kid's adventure story, told in the first person by Tolkien, who is introducing young people to the notion of Middle-earth. A lot of it is very light-hearted.
I've written short stories in first person, but you have so much more control writing in third person. Third person, you know what everybody's thinking. First person is very limiting, and I could never sustain a first person novel before.
With 'The Leftovers,' I was actually super, super lucky. It was my first major audition. When I came out, the casting director was kissing me on the face, and I was like, 'Oh, that's probably a good sign.'
There was always a lot of pressure - I fought on Channel 5 in my first fight and got two million views - but luckily I'm the kind of person who thrives under pressure. I use it to fuel my performances and training, knowing that all eyes are on me and that there's a lot to live up to. It made me harder, tougher and more determined.
I've always loved Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. There's this wonderful chapter in which we get a first-person account of the monster's first impressions of the world, being in the woods and taking things in. We're seeing the world as if for the first time. That's just fascinating.
The first time I met Garry Shandling was my audition for 'The Larry Sanders Show,' with Garry and his casting director Francine Maisler. I can recall every minute of it. He was gracious and kind, and he read with me. He was terrific.
The casting process for 'Hate Mail' just got so difficult. Once you lock in one person and then you try to find the next person, you lose the first person and then the financing falls away.
I think first-person narrators should be complex, because otherwise the first-person is too shallow and predictable. I like a first-person narrator who can't totally be trusted.
When I went to do my big audition with actors for Mr. Blonde, the thing that was very interesting was the first person to actually do the audition with the song, and they kind of actually acted out the whole scene, they weren't so great. It wasn't that they were magnificent, but the song, it was the first -it was all - been in my head.
In my view, philosophers have shown a great deal more respect for the first-person point of view than it deserves. There's a lot of empirical work on the various psychological mechanisms by way of which the first-person point of view is produced, and, when we understand this, I believe, we can stop romanticising and mythologising the first-person perspective.
The way that I see third person is it's actually first person. Writing for me is all voice work. Third person narrative is just as character-driven as first person narrative for me in terms of a voice. I don't write very much in third person.
The first one is your first World Cup, so you go into it with a lot of pressure, trying to take it all in, but you are just so focused.
I got my big break in Bollywood with Anurag Kashyap's 'Raman Raghav 2.0' when I got a call from one of the casting directors to appear for an audition. At that point, I didn't think that I would make the cut since I was auditioning for a Bollywood film for the very first time. Within an hour of the audition, I was told that I had been selected.
A fashion icon to me is somebody who has, the first person who struck you and introduced you to the world of fashion, and that person is my mom.
The most important thing any person can focus on, whether in a first audition or a first job, is to be the best you can be. The rest will take care of itself.
My first audition was for Terrence Malick's 'The Tree of Life.' These casting directors came through Texas, and they recruited somewhere around 10,000 kids to come and audition for this movie. They sent me a letter in the mail, and I went and auditioned for this movie.