I can't tell you the number of times I was one of the first people at the arenas or at TV, constantly trying to better myself. I can honestly say that my hard work paid off. My resilience paid off. My persistence paid off.
I did not direct any of my investments nor did I know of these investments.
Care work produces public goods, and should be supported in families by policies such as paid parental leave and caregiver tax credits, and by investments in good training and wages for caregiving, including early childhood education, in the market.
One of the best investments we can make in a child’s life is high-quality early education.
I didn't get paid for performances most of my life. If I did, I would be billionaire now, and I'm not.
I just did in my early twenties what most did when they were teenagers, being free and exploring and making mistakes, but I did it in France. I did it privately.
Early on in my life I comprehended that death is the most tragic event in our life. Events of early Monday July 14, 1958 [Coup in Iraq] had convinced me that hate is the most destructive force in our life.
A month before graduation I got an off-Broadway job. Then I did some commercials, including one for MCI. You can only see half of me, but it paid well. Thank God for commercials.
Many of the biggest and most far-reaching investments we make in our lives are investments that have little or nothing to do with money.
In the ancient world, taxes were paid in kind: landowners paid in crops or livestock; the landless paid with their labor. Taxing trade made medieval monarchs rich and funded the early-modern state.
I lost all my investments after everything crashed in 2001. Prior to that, I'd been living off the interest on my investments, which was very healthy because it allowed frequent travel, and I had a lovely apartment.
I started in theatre when I was 13 or 14 years old and did a lot of theatre until my early thirties. Off-Broadway stuff - off-off-off-off-Broadway stuff - and I do love it.
People who have the drive to achieve spend most of their time on what brings them the most tangible, immediate sense of success. Investments in our family only pay off in the very long term.
We have lots of evidence that putting investments in early childhood education, even evidence from very hard-nosed economists, is one of the very best investments that the society can possibly make. And yet we still don't have public support for things like preschools.
We borrowed money, it helped us with bonds and what not, and the Federal Government backed it, but it was a guarantee, it was not a grant. And we not only paid it off, but we paid it off ahead of time.
The thing where I thought I made it was when I paid my house off. It wasn't actually a moment on stage - it was the first bit of financial security. It was the first time I looked at my house, and it was all paid off, and I thought, 'Alright. Jokes paid for this.'