When you write you in a way write out of what you think of as your best self, the part of you that is lacking in foibles and weaknesses and egotism and vanities and so on. You're just trying to really say something as truthful as you can out of the best that you have in you.
I don't like to veer away from the truth because I think that's what people have fallen in love with about my music. It's honest. I can't portray to you something that I've never been through or something I didn't watch someone close to me go through. It's the best way for people to get to me know.
My biggest thing is telling a truthful story, something that is rooted in something and is very honest. If I read a script and you want me to take off my top, and it doesn't serve a purpose, then I'm not going to do it.
'50/50' is a comedy. I shouldn't say it's a buddy comedy because it's not farcical, and it's based on a true story, but it's viewing that experience through a very truthful lens of humour.
In order to be truthful
We must do more than speak the truth.
We must also hear truth.
We must also receive truth.
We must also act upon truth.
We must also search for truth.
The difficult truth
Within us and around us.
We must devote ourselves to truth.
Otherwise we are dishonest
And our lives are mistaken.
God grant us the strength and the courage
To be truthful.
Amen
There's just something about youth and comedy that go together. Maybe it's that foolishness, that silliness that you can get away with when you're younger, that you can't get away with when you're older.
I think it's true of every great comedy that it's rooted in some dramatic, incredibly personal truth. And it's true of all great drama that there has to be comedy.
If I have a passion for anything, it's more the truth than politics, and I think that's what got me interested in comedy in the first place, because the best comedy is the truth. People recognize that.
When I'm playing comedy, I never do 'jokes.' Sometimes I'll deliver a line in a way I think is more likely to get a laugh, but all the best comedy is played straight. What's funny is the way it hits the world around it or the way it hits the other characters.
The conventional wisdom is - people say this all the time - you should only write something when you're far enough away from it that you can have a perspective. But that's not true. That's a story that you're telling. The truth of it is here, right now. It's the only truth that we ever know. And I'm interested in that truth and the confusion being part of the experience and sorting it your way through and figuring it out.
The best way to test whether you are saying the truth or not - if you say something and people don't react then it's not the real truth. But if people start reacting then what you are saying has got an element of truth.
You get into comedy because you are insecure, and you communicate with the world through comedy to sort of alleviate the tension of those insecurities and to find a way to make people like you other than the way you look or how good you are at sports. I don't think that really goes away.
I have people that are affected by what I do, what I say, and that would be the one place where it gets complicated. But being honest and truthful - I just believe that's the best way to be.
My job is to get people to write something truthful, something about truth and beauty - wherever they are - and to understand how literature is made. And then if they become great writers, that's great, and probably has nothing to do with me.
Sometimes, I have to really monitor myself, but the only monitoring job I really do on myself on stage is, Is this truthful? Is this truthful? Is this truthful? Ideally, I send it in a flow of truth.
Five Truths
about
Fear Truth
1. The fear
will never
go away as
long as I continue
to grow. Truth 2. The only way to get rid of the fear of doing something is to go out and do it. Truth 3. The only way to feel better about myself is to go out… and do it. Truth 4. Not only am I going to experience fear whenever I’m on unfamiliar territory, but so is everyone else. Truth 5. Pushing through fear is less frightening than living with the underlying fear that comes from a feeling of helplessness.