Quotes

As we get more transparent with data sets about infrastructure and systems management, I have a feeling we'll see big changes in how we think about complexity and our relationship to our actions.

I've found that when everyone rallies behind a cause, and when they learn their effort can contribute something bigger, they get engaged.

My mom's a psychologist, and I think that has influenced me on a personal level. Plus, I'm just generally interested in visualization and humanity, social activity and technology, and what happens in aggregate.

As technology evolves, it manipulates our culture, and there's a huge opportunity to push ourselves further. I think it actually makes ourselves maybe more human, or at least human in a different way, that we can connect together in amazingly different ways and powerful new ways.

As a kid, I was always into art at the same time as computers, and eventually I realised I was making more interesting stuff with my keyboard than with my hands. I really enjoyed modifying computer games more than playing them, so that got me into programming.

I studied at UC Santa Cruz before going on to do a grad program at UCLA. Santa Cruz was like an awesome hippie summer camp. I got to take a vacation from reality and hang out on beaches and in forests.

The truth is I'm not actually an expert programmer! I really don't consider myself to be an expert at anything. For me, it's more about having a well-rounded and broad horizon. I think that's where a lot of the more interesting things come from - mashing up completely disparate aspects of life to create something new and original.

I grew up with the idea of the cyborg and the robot, but at the same time I felt this intense disconnection between the things I was engaged with and inspired by in terms of fun and play. It seemed like paintings and drawings were so static.

Beware of addictive medicines. Everything in moderation. This applies particularly to the Internet and your sofa. The physical world is ultimately the source of all inspiration. Which is to say, if all else fails: take a bike ride.

In high school, my English teacher Celeste McMenamin introduced me to the great novels and Shakespeare and taught me how to write. Essays, poetry, critical analysis. Writing is a skill that was painful then but a love of mine now.

The idea of doing a production of 'Carousel' that doesn't feel like it's stuck in the 1950s really intrigues me.

My dad's paternal grandparents were musically inclined. And I remember as a little kid going to visit them in their senior building, and they were, like, the stars of the building, especially hosting and performing in their senior talent show.

Life in New York can be so, I don't know, chaotic, overwhelming, busy, frantic, and often, seniors can easily get overlooked.

I get to sing and act and write and create and produce for a living and share art with people, and I feel like a piece of that is in honor of those who came before me.

I think that's why I'm an actor: so I can tell those stories without having to really live through those stories with real consequences and real stakes, real responsibility.

I sort of wrongfully judged 'Mamma Mia!' for so long. I thought of it as a jukebox musical that I wasn't interested in. I was so wrong.

I always try to make each character my own.

You have to learn how to act a pop song. You have to find the balance of the pop from the pop song and the lyrical significance of the scene you are in.

I was just so excited to have a child! I held him up like he was Simba in 'The Lion King.' I wanted to sing 'The Circle of Life.'

It'll be interesting to raise kids in New York City. I'm from suburbia, so I don't really have any experience with what it's going to be like here.

Women are just so much tougher and more patient than men are - their capacity for empathy blows me away. And their capacity to deal with stress for long periods of time is also kind of awe inspiring.

2009 was crazy enough! I can't believe I worked with Jeremy Irons, Joan Allen, Marsha Mason, Catherine Zeta-Jones and Angela Lansbury, Jack O'Brien and Trevor Nunn in the same 12 months.

I'm trying to go with the flow, which is not what I used to do. I used to try to micromanage my career choices.

There's parts of it that I connect to - being a father and everything - but 'Mamma Mia!' allows me to go out there and be me and have fun. I've never really had the chance to do that with so much freedom.

My mom tells me the first show we saw was 'The Secret Garden,' but I don't remember that.