Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
I like being different people.
Doing eight shows a week is hard.
You need raw talent to be successful.
'Kiss Me, Kate' was my 'Ragtime' Tony.
Variety is the key to not being bored.
Artists make our lives livable and enjoyable.
I was practically raised with Christmas music.
I love being outside, and I love the fresh air.
I'd always been a huge fan of Stephen Schwartz.
My job as an entertainer is to give a great show.
If anything, when I was young, I wanted to be an orchestra.
I don't recommend skipping college, but things have worked out for me.
I love seeing the stars, and I love being around my friends and family.
When you're doing eight shows a week, you don't have much of a personal life.
My family's very, very mixed. I am, I guess, a kind of melting pot in a person.
I hate those vacuous musicals, the happy-happy, 'Let's have a good time' shows.
I kind of feel the career chose me. My motto has always been, 'Go where I'm wanted.'
Fear is destructive. Fear and creativity don't mix. Ultimately, it doesn't do you any good.
I'm having a ball on 'Glee.' It's a joy to be working there - the whole cast is so talented.
To take the ugly language out of 'Ragtime' is to sanitize it, and that does it a great disservice.
When I was 6 years old, I asked my parents for an organ. I don't have any idea why I wanted an organ.
Left to my own devices, I would go to bed at 2:30 or 3, but I can't do that if I'm getting up at 6:50!
My father was a huge jazz fan, so I remember him playing Duke Ellington, Sarah Vaughn, and Count Basie.
I gravitate to rhythmic music, so I listen to jazz, world music, Indian music, Hawaiian music, all kinds.
I think I just had it by osmosis: an appreciation of Duke Ellington before I really even knew who he was.
Music is liquid. It's meant to be messed with and played with and stretched and pulled and pushed, I think.
'Ragtime' is about how we get through ugliness, how we talk together, work together, get through it together.
There's a lot of risk involved in acting, and you can't take the same kind of risks when you have a kid to feed.
On Broadway, you are working with some incredible people, and they have great reasons for doing things the way they do.
Oddly enough, I almost never listen to show tunes. But there are some shows I love, like Adam Guettel's 'Floyd Collins.'
To me, a theater is a kind of a sacred space. It needs a kind of ceremony, like what happens when you consecrate a church.
When I moved to Los Angeles, I thought, 'Whatever hits, I'll go that direction. If it's music, fine; if it's acting, fine.'
I've always felt that my career was in wiser hands than mine. Whatever, in its good time, is supposed to happen will happen.
The first time I really had an influence on a show was during 'Ragtime.' It's still the most magical show that I've ever done.
I love rearranging and reimagining tunes, so I want my audience to enjoy hearing songs in a new way and make their own discoveries.
The first audition I did was for 'Trapper John, M.D.' I was surprised to get the part, and then to have it last for seven years was a bonus.
I always call myself the luckiest actor in the world because I made a living solely as a performer from the time I left home at 17 years old.
I studied film scoring and orchestration and conducting and arranging in my twenties, and I scored a lot of television shows and other things.
The Actors Fund is a human services organization, so our focus has been on caring for the entire human as opposed to dealing with the disease.
Each time I have performed in Utah, I had a great time, and the audiences seem to enjoy what I do. The audiences are very warm and very appreciative.
I didn't really think I liked jazz all that much until I was about 18. That's when the freedom and possibilities of it began to seem appealing to me.
I love doing theater. It's what I grew up in and is my roots. I get a huge fulfillment from it. But if my path is to go someplace else, hey, I'm there.
I like to capture the spirit of what the writers intended but find my own nuances. That comes from jazz - the invention and freeness within a structure.
I'd been playing the piano since I was 6 and wanted to be a composer, but I also wanted to be an actor. I decided to just pursue both and see which won out.
One of the best pieces of wisdom I ever got is you work because you work, meaning you work because you're saying yes to things, and you're connecting with people.
I've sung a whole lot of jazz. It's my favorite style of music to sing. People don't realize it, because they're so accustomed to hearing me sing musical theater.
At our house, we'd always open presents with our Christmas records playing. 'Little Drummer Boy' was one of my favorites when I was a kid because it was about a kid.
There is a built-in appreciation for music that is so much a part of the LDS culture. Utahns know that music can be divine and can touch a person's spirit in a unique way.
The older I get, I realize, 'Man, I'm a very rare bird,' and that's not because of necessarily my talent or ability; it so much depends on luck and just the grace of the universe.
People who are artists professionally are not artists because they want to be artists; they have to be artists. They're compelled to get that creativity out and to share that with others.