Now I'm having to live with sales of around 50 000 per album - but I'm pretty content with my place in the general scheme of things even if it's meant I don't drive a fancy car and can't afford grand vacations.

The hardest part was when I was in high school not having a job and always being broke. I had to get to auditions without a car. I either took the bus or walked.

I was a little different. I still say I'm a little different because success to me is not having the most money or having the biggest car or the biggest house.

Now having said that I realize that releasing a film in the real world is like trying to get General Motors to release a handmade car.

I knew that by getting behind the wheel of the car and having had something to drink the responsibility laid on my shoulders.

One thing that worried me was how writers get categorized and so they end up having to write the same kind of book again and again. That is fine if it is what you want to do but I would rather be locked in the trunk of my car with a weasel than write the same book every three years until I die.

If you don't have the story and the unfolding of the trajectory of the saga it's like getting in a car and not having any gas.

If a movie is really working you forget for two hours your Social Security number and where your car is parked. You are having a vicarious experience. You are identifying in one way or another with the people on the screen.

The newly decorated theatres produced things like car parks and restaurants so you could have a good night out quite cheaply without all that bother of having to go somewhere else.

Having played many roles of scientific intellect I do have an empathy for that world. It's been hard on me because flying the Enterprise for seven years in Star Trek and sitting in Cerebro in X-men has led people to believe that I know what I'm talking about. But I'm still trying to work out how to operate the air conditioning unit on my car.