When I was a little kid I loved the Marx brothers and discovered Monty Python when I was 10 or 11-years-old. I used to take a tape recorder and hold it up in front of the TV to record entire episodes to play over and over again, so that I could memorise it.
I loved 'SNL' growing up, and I would trick my babysitter into letting me stay up to watch it. My family would rent Marx brothers' movies and Monty Python episodes, and we watched 'In Living Color', 'The State', and 'Strangers with Candy'.
But as a kid, I loved 'Monty Python.' My Dad was a devout watcher. We used to watch it when we ate dinner!
'Monty Python' was never on TV in the U.K. when I was a kid.
Somehow I got a hold of an address for Vonnegut shortly after making the Marx Brothers film. Vonnegut wrote back, saying that he had seen the Marx brothers film and loved it. That became the foundation of our friendship: old movies and comedies.
I've always been more of a nerdy, academic type. I loved 'Star Wars' growing up. I have three older brothers, so they were a big influence on me. We loved 'Danger Mouse,' and we love 'Monty Python'. We loved any kind of British comedy and 'Wallace and Gromit' and all of that stuff.
Even as a kid, I'd have a recorder, and I'd lean it up against a TV and record 'I Love Lucy.' I loved hearing the audience laughing. It was really exciting to me.
I couldn't afford to go to the record store to buy new tapes, so I'd tape everything off the radio. Just hit record when my song came on. I used to take my mom's tapes and tape over them. I had a nice little collection. Had my own Stephen Jackson mixtapes off the radio!
When I was at Doncaster Rovers Belles, I used to play up front or as a number 10, but when I joined Chelsea in 2015, I was more a midfielder, and over the last few years, I've moved into the back four.
Growing up in Kentucky, I used to hang out with four running buddies as a kid - 6, 10, and 11 years old. Two of them would later come out, and so 50 percent of my friends as a kid were gay.
I grew up in Canada and I was 10 years old when 9/11 happened. And I think that really changed the landscape for Arabs around the world, obviously, but especially Arab actors, I think we started getting viewed a little different. Like, my whole experience just as a kid before 9/11 and after 9/11 was drastically different.
I grew up in a place where books were very, very scarce, and I loved to read. I used to read the writing on my breakfast Ovaltine over and over again because it was in front of me, and I couldn't help but read anything that was in front of me.
I started performing at two or three on a tape recorder, one of those little flat recorders where you just push play and record.
Growing up, I was definitely surrounded by music all the time. My parents used to always play music; my dad used to have reggae on. I remember walking around with a cassette recorder, and I used to just record the songs I would hear on the radio so I could play it back when I feel like.
I used to have the 'Best Of Eddie Murphy' VHS tape that I wore out completely, watching it over and over again. His 'Buckwheat Sings' is, to this day, one of my all-time favorite sketches on the show. I also loved the one where he plays the Tooth Fairy.
As a little kid when I would watch 'Monty Python'... that would just blow me away because it was just so silly and absurd, but so intelligent, and I loved that.
I like musicals that are sometimes comedic, but I haven't even seen the Monty Python musical, and I'm a huge Monty Python fan.