In Ehrenfeld, we were all jammed together. All the fathers were foreign-born - Welsh, Irish, Polish, Sicilian. We were so jammed together, we picked up each other's accents. And we spoke some broken English. When I got into the service, people used to think I was from a foreign country.

I'm entertained more by my own thoughts than by the thoughts of others. I don't mind answering questions. But in an exchange of conversation, I wind up being a pair of ears.

When I was a kid, I was always drawing things. I'd get butcher paper or grocery bags and draw on them.

Times were poor. I wore hand-me-downs. And because the kids just older than me in the family were girls, sometimes I had to wear my sisters' hand-me-downs.

When you act, your whole body is the instrument.

I hung around New York and did a little stock-company stuff. I wasn't really sure at that time if I even wanted to be an actor. I got no encouragement.

I tell you this: if I was in the house with those people in the Bergman flicks, I'd walk right out, much less pay $5 to see them.

I can play the character better because of the roundness of my experience - because of the things I've been through. All those method guys - like that De Niro, Stallone, and what's his name, Pacino - they're all the same.

The critics never see my role as it is - as a man protecting his garden killing poisonous snakes. Instead, they say it's just me again committing violence.

I supply a presence. There are never any long dialogue scenes to establish a character.