It`s a very, very fascinating story for me, cause it`s about a man who`s been doing bad; bad things. And he`s a father of four children in parochial school, he`s a lieutenant of detectives, but he`s in conflict with himself and with trying to do what`s right.

Well, there`s so much in that film that is so important to my living, you know? So many issues raised in that film, one of them you just mentioned.

That`s like asking a cobbler if he`s made too many pairs of shoes.

She had said one time, make a choice and do it like Hercules. So if that is all of what is being offered, the idea is to always do it like Hercules and I always followed her advise and now I`m here talking to you.

I mean, you work and you try and find the work that suits you the best and you enjoy the most.

I`ve always found it not only easy, but enjoyable. It`s necessary for us to reach out and I`m speaking for myself here. I certainly have a sense of responsibility to reach out to these people in the theatre who might look to someone like me for some guidance.

I was out to have a good time and have some fun. It`s a fun script and fun people are in the movie.

Fear is a marker I need to rise above, otherwise I would drown in my fear of myself.

Everything is difficult, and everything worthwhile is difficult. A certain need, a need not unlike Mickey had: to know, to understand, and I had that need to understand and to know.

I was in a cave and I needed to draw some pictures on the wall about what my journey was, and that drive, that need, led me to acting.

I thought Jack`s directing job was the best thing about the film.

To create characters, one must build background. And one of the tools we use is improvisation.

Existence is a struggle.

I don`t think about those things, really. I work hard on everything I do. Everything is a struggle, everything is hard, everything is difficult.

Hardly any actor objects to press. It`s a question of it being done in the way they like to see it done, meaning to get down to the serious interview what the profession is so we can reach out to the people to help them get along.

Uhm, I`m the one wanting the lessons! I don`t want to say too much about it because I`d rather have you see the movie, but he`s trying to find his music.

What fascinated me mostly about Mickey Cohen was that he, in his later years, hired someone to help him to comprehend literature, to help him to read better, to understand words better.

[Explaining why he supports a mandatory military draft] "We, the people, should participate in the privileges we have in this democracy that we live in, and we should all share in the dangers and the risks with our lives to protect the freedoms that we have. I don`t see how our young men can feel they`re part of the country if they don`t participate in the defense of the country - in the defense of our values - when it`s necessary to do so. I feel, strongly, that by excluding themselves, they sacrifice something integral. They separate themselves from the hero`s journey - this journey we all must take to find ourselves."

So there`s no such thing as one too many this, one too many that. I remember, you`re reminding me of early in my career, somebody said to me: why are you taking so many roles as a policeman.

I read Get Shorty and Be Cool. He`s a wonderful writer. He has his ear and his pen on the pulse of these kinds of characters he`s writing about.

Everyone wants to learn something; maybe not everyone makes the effort, because they get discouraged. I certainly was like that as a teenager in Brooklyn, always trying to hide my ignorance. But you have to find the strength to acknowledge that ignorance within yourself, otherwise you are going to remain stagnant. I learnt a valuable lesson with Ridley Scott. My agent kept insisting that I go watch the show-reel of this commercial director and I kept turning him down, thinking there was no way that I was even going to consider working with a commercial director. In the end I saw his reel and I was blown away by how great it was.

So I reached into my bag of tricks and looked for what was funny to me, what would enable me to have a good time and have a lot of fun with this guy.

Well unfortunately I didn`t work with Andre much. But rap is a strong presence in the culture and anyone is going to grateful for its appearance, grateful for any kind of music that has the kind of effect that rap has had on us all.

He brought imagination to the story of the Creation.

That period was a very flowery one for me. It was the beginning of something, of a movement you might say. I was lucky enough to be there.

They have equal weight and you do the same work you`d do if you were playing a dramatic role.

The way I see things, the way I see life, I see it as a struggle. And there`s a great deal of reward I have gained coming to that understanding - that existence is a struggle.

You`re working on being a father, so that is something that when you experience it you`ll understand the profundity of wanting to protect something dear to you.

But then again, you know, the pimp in TAXI DRIVER has this reason, given the environment he was living in.

I don`t want people to think that awards amount to the value of an actor. Real success means involvement - to engage oneself totally in something. Unless you become involved, you will stay uninvolved. If money is your god, you will accumulate money, but little else. If you seek out the experience of something...you have a good chance to have a full life.

Well, we are not doing that film actually. At least I am not at the moment, but we are making an effort to get it done; I don`t know whether we`ll get the financing for it. The old story we had it, it fell out of place and this and that.

It`s always a pleasure to see John. I`m fond of telling people that when I was a young actor in NY and had no work ,no money, you know the story because you`re heard it before.

Then I heard this genius teacher Stella Adler - I recommend you read anything you might find about her and if you have anyone interested in theatre, you get them one of her books.

I grew up with a lot of guys, some of them are dead, some of them are this and some of them that, and some of them very, very powerful, bright young men, who became this instead of that simply because of a lack of guidance - that`s all.

You didn`t hear the angels singing. It was brought down to Mother Earth, which is where it should be. And that led me to a lot of other reading.

All actors do that. Should do that and do that. For the most part. I say all actors. I`m exaggerating, but you know who does and who doesn`t. Vince is a wonderful young actor who knows his work and did a beautiful job on this film.

Well, you sort of get out of the pool room, you get out of the Marine Corps, you get out and read some literature, you become involved with people who also want to know and are ready to share some ideas about literature and thoughts, and it becomes nourished that way.