Zitate

Just the service aspect of running a nonprofit is so gratifying because it takes the attention off yourself. I'm not an acting monk or anything. I'm not, like, the most well-adjusted actor. But it's really designed to focus on yourself, or it can be. So it's good to have something else to focus on that reminds you that it's not always about you. Something I learned in the Marine Corps that I've applied to acting is, one, taking direction, and then working with a group of people to accomplish a mission and knowing your role within that team.

I'm like a sight gag, I have this really big face...I don't totally get it. I mean, when I read for Girls (2012) I was, like, the script says 'Handsome Carpenter,' so someone else is going to get the part. They will have someone handsome, not me. I mean, I'm not in any danger of getting leading-man parts.

The deadly thing in my job is to attach too much meaning to everything. You have to have a sense of humor about yourself...I'm definitely trying to figure this all out as I go along, how to craft a career. As things get bigger, I have days of depression, sitting in the house and wondering 'What are you doing? Is it even relevant?'

I auditioned in Chicago for Juilliard and didn't get in. I was basically living in a back room of my parents' house, paying rent and not doing anything with my life. I'd like to say it was patriotic to join the Marines, but it was also that I was doing nothing honorable with my life, and spending too much time at McDonald's.

In the military, you learn the essence of people. You see so many examples of self-sacrifice and moral courage. In the rest of life, you don't get that many opportunities to be sure of your friends.

At the Emmy Awards, everybody runs up to you and says, 'Aren't you having the time of your life?' I mean, I was never after trying to get an Emmy. The whole spectacle seems cheesy and dated. The thing that motivates me most is being petrified of not having a place to put my voice.

[observation 2013, on continuing to perform in Girls (2012)] Every season is a different thing. The first season we were still trying to figure out what it is we're doing, and I think that still applies to the third season, which we just did. There's still an ambitious pursuit of 'How do we go deeper and surprise ourselves?'

[on his musical contribution to Inside Llewyn Davis (2013)] They keep the music department very separate from the actors at Juilliard. I am musical though. I grew up in church and did a lot of singing at choir, and a lot at choir in school, and playing the piano - things like that. But I wouldn't call myself a musician by any means compared to the [others]. Musical in that I own instruments that are at my house that I play with people. But not like in that I have mastered any of them.

[on working with the Coen brothers] I think they have a common theme, even though they work in completely different ways. Specificity of story - so clear with what it is they're after - and different opinions about how to get there. They're kind of unanimous in that way. Just to see the Coens at the state they are in with their careers, and how they still have this relentless pursuit to to tell the best version possible, and do all their homework - it's incredible to have been able to witness.