Quotes

I'm actually a Midwest kid. My dad was in construction, so we moved around every couple of years. I've lived in Muncie, Indiana, Sioux City, Iowa, Kansas City MO, Glen Rock, Wyoming; all over the Midwest. My Dad moved down to Florida when I was in senior high. It was cheap to go to college in Florida, so I became a Gator for four years. That's where I started doing theater.

[on making Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story (2004)] Well, it was a lot of hard work. It was like pitching 100 baseballs every day. We were all iced up by the end of the day. It's hard to throw overhand so many times. 'Vince (Vaughn)' started throwing with his left hand one day, because he was just done. It was a very physical shoot. It was fun, but it wasn't without its aches and pains.

[on coming up with the voice for "Bill", his character on King of the Hill (1997)] I have done a lot of Southern theater; I came out of the University Of Florida. I did do a lot of Southern plays in New York and regional stuff on the East Coast, so I had done "Driving Miss Daisy" and all of these things. So it was kind of an amalgamation of those things. I actually auditioned for "Dale" first. It didn't feel right to me, so I said, "Let me try this guy". That felt a lot more comfortable.

My whole career, I've tried to bounce back and forth between everything, and not get typed out. I've done a pretty good job of not getting typed. So I'll do a lot of comedy, and then I'll not do comedy for a year, do The West Wing (1999) and then do something else. You have to remind casting directors out here that you don't just do one thing. There's a lot of people who do just one thing.

(2007) My goal as an actor was to work-to be a working actor, whether it was in theater, and, well, I didn't even consider film and television when I was in New York, but what came along, came along. So, in that sense, I have achieved my goal of being a working actor. And luckily enough, I have recognition to be able to do jobs that I want to do instead of doing jobs for money, which is an enviable position to be in. It's what you work for your whole life anyway, to take jobs that interest you and not jobs that are just crap.

[on his early TV work] I enjoyed doing Night Court (1984), because Harry Anderson actually wrote me a second episode that I came and did for them. They were all fun. I did a lot of '(Steven) Bochco' stuff-Civil Wars (1991), NYPD Blue (1993). It was all fun. I got to do Star Trek: The Next Generation (1987). I was a lawyer one day and a Klingon the next.

[on his role in Ghost (1990)] That was fun. It was one of the first couple of films that I did in New York. Doing Broadway, you are able to get in to some film auditions at the same time. I did Ghost (1990) and Crocodile Dundee II (1988) within two or three months of each other. It was great to work with 'Demi (Moore)'. We both had little kids at the time. We talked mostly about that.

I would have to say NewsRadio (1995) is the highlight of my career. I love the character so much.

[on Phil Hartman's career direction before his tragic death]: At the time of his death, he was changing his life. He had done a fair amount of movies, but they were pretty over-the-top comedies. I remember having a conversation with him that he didn't want to do that anymore. He wanted to get into more high-quality pictures - not necessarily dramas - but something that had more meat and better scripts. So he was headed in that direction. I think he would've gone on to become a tremendous film comedian, because that was his sensibility.