Alice Ripley was someone who had had a huge effect on me when I had gotten out of college and decided that this was the road I wanted to take - to write musicals.
At 21, right out of college, I had two producers, about my age, who had never produced a show before, and they wanted me to write and produce an hour-long show before I turned 22. Which is a whole lot of work for someone who's just an 'airhead.'
There's actually a time when I got cast in something and it was announced that someone else was cast. I hadn't been told yet if I had the role and I had a breakdown because I really wanted it and it was announced on this website that this other girl had gotten it. I was so sad and called my agents and said, "You guys didn't tell me this other person got the role!" They were like, "No, they haven't decided yet." Then two hours later I got the call that said I had the role.
I had been playing a lot of chess and I wasn't really enjoying it, so I decided to go to college to see what else is out there for me. But after about six or seven months away from the game, I just decided that the whole college life wasn't for me and that's why I decided to come back.
I was at Reed [College] for only a few months. My parents intended for me to stay there for all four years but I decided that college wasn't right for me. I had no idea what I wanted to do I didn't see how college was going to help me.
I never wanted to spend a month away from my life. One time I was out on the road for three weeks in a row and I when I came back someone had broken into my apartment and the water had evaporated from the toilet.
When I decided that I wanted to go to college, I wanted to be a school teacher for 7th and 8th grade boys because I felt that was an important time for them. I had gone astray at that point in my life and really wanted to help keep them from making the same mistake I had made.
When I decided that I will become a music director, the first thing I wanted to do was to make songs for Vishesh Films as I used to love their musicals. I had eight to ten songs which I had made only for them and fortunately 'Sun Raha Hai' from that list was liked by them and it actually opened doors for me.
As her newest apprentice, it had been my job to go to the market every morning. I had gotten all the jobs no one else wanted, but I had treated each task as if it had been essential to do well -- a trick I had learned from my father.
My foster parents were very religious. They told me that they had not decided to take me in, rather that it was God that had decided it for them.
I had written a book. For various reasons, the publishing industry had decided that my book was going to be 'important.' The novel had taken me 12-and-a-half years to write, and after being with the book for so long, I had no real perspective on the merits or demerits of what I had written. I hoped it was good, but feared that it wasn't.
You see, it took me so long, it was such a struggle, to move myself out of musicals - because I had had a success, nobody wanted to allow me to direct a non-musical picture. It was so hard. And the only way I could get it going was to become a producer myself.
I was someone who was out of control and not to be worked with. It was partly because method acting was a new thing in Hollywood then and Marlon Brando had gotten through and Montgomery Clift had gotten through and James Dean but beyond that there wasn't really anybody.
Ever since I had decided to study at the National School of Drama, New Delhi, I had wanted to take up acting as my profession.
My wife and I had decided not to let anybody take pictures of our home because it was just the last place on earth we had that was unscathed. But people have climbed over the fence; they've taken aerial shots. They've gotten my address and put it on the Internet.
I remember wanting to write a book with someone, the someone being Kate [DiCamillo], and we decided to write about two friends. We had no idea how to begin this project - neither of us had ever collaborated with another writer - and I'm pretty sure that we began by giving our two friends a sock, just to see what they'd do with it. And it went from there.
While my college had done an excellent job recruiting me, I had no road map for what I was supposed to do once I made it to campus.