The age of 18 seemed the right time to try something different in my life. Moving to the U.K. was a risk, and I was never confident that I could ever make a full-time living being a musician, but I had to try. Initially, I worked as a jazz musician in pubs or with bands.
I always dreamed of being an entertainer. So, my whole life to some extent, or from the age that I can remember onwards, I knew I was going to have to make some sort of attempt at being noticed for being funny.
I remember thinking, 'I'll audition just once and if it doesn't work out I'll never think about it ever again.'
When I had signed my first film, I had not even told my family about it.
I've watched people quit YouTube to become doctors.
I know everybody wants to make it to the NFL, but it doesn't happen like that.
I've flown halfway around the world to kiss a girl. I jumped on a plane and flew to Australia.
My dad had a dream of living in an Irish castle, even when we were in Argentina, and in 1960 he found a place without any heat or running water. We had no money, so it was tough.
This has been a dream for me.
During the Great Depression, when people laughed their worries disappeared. Audiences loved these funny men. I decided to become one.
Without a dream you'll not get anywhere.
It was a dream to be a singer/performer, but I never thought I had a chance or had a real shot; I never thought I was good enough.
Since my sophomore year in high school, I knew I didn't want to do anything but be a professional athlete. I knew when I got to college there was no way anybody was going to stop me from being an NFL player.
I started to submit when I was twelve, and obviously at that time they weren't good enough, and I suppose in my heart of hearts I knew it. But you have to start sooner or later, you have to dig in.
One day I woke up, had an early mid-life crisis, and decided it all had to change. I went and did Logan Murray's comedy course for 11 weeks and then started sneakily doing open-spot gigs, and that was it.
I never not wanted to be a singer. Since I was 3, I knew this was what I wanted to do. Well, I can't say I wanted to do it, but I fantasized and thought about it all the time. I never thought it would actually happen.
I didn't actually begin professionally acting until I was 30.
There is no doubt in my mind that I was going to do what my father did, but it wasn't kind of a family-business thing.
Even before I made my high school team, I'd say I want to be a NBA player, and people laughed at me with, 'Get out of here, you ain't going to be a NBA player. You don't even play basketball.'
Instead of becoming an engineer like my brother, I moved to New York to be an actor.
I wasn't entitled to dream so big. The idea of me being a writer wasn't even possible in my mind. Even when I began to write and first published, I couldn't call myself a writer.
At about twelve I just knew, something clicked, and I knew I wanted to be an actor and my parents, to their credit, granted this 12 year old girl a chance to give it a try.
I didn't have an acting job when I moved to L.A. I was just naive enough to think that moving to L.A. was the next step after college. My parents were really supportive.
I got to the stage where I physically couldn't carry on unless I gave comedy a go: it was necessity.
It's a lot of people's goal to be the lead in a movie, and that was never my goal. I just wanted to be the third banana in an ensemble comedy.
