Thus after finishing high school I started with high expectations and enthusiasm to study chemistry at the famous Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich.

I know I had my equivalents in Adrian Lester and Lenny James when I was at drama school. I remember David Harewood doing 'Othello' at the National and Adrian Lester having done Cheek by Jowl's famous 'As You Like It and Company' at the Donmar. Not necessarily performances I saw but just the fact they happened was massively encouraging.

I studied Japanese language and culture in college and graduate school and afterward went to work in Tokyo where I met a young man whose father was a famous businessman and whose mother was a geisha.

I was a shy kid but somehow I knew I would make it as a performer. I'd always be telling my mum that I was going to be a famous singer. In my school yearbooks I would write 'Remember me when I'm famous.' I knew I had a gift.

I wanted to be a political science professor and go to school in Boston. I never wanted to be a big famous movie star and TV star. It kind of found me.

Ever since grammar school I knew I wanted to be famous - I always wanted to be a singer.

Being famous is just like being in high school. But I'm not interested in being the cheerleader. I'm not interested in being Gwen Stefani. She's the cheerleader and I'm out in the smoker shed.

After a fellow gets famous it doesn't take long for someone to bob up that used to sit by him in school.

There's no difference between fame and infamy now. There's a new school of professional famous people that don't do anything. They don't create anything.

My parents did a great job raising me and my two sisters. We all graduated from high school and we all graduated from college. So to be a good representative of my family is probably my greatest accomplishment thus far.