The stupidest thing I ever did was turn down 'Terms of Endearment' to do 'Cannonball Run II.' Jim Brooks wrote the part of the astronaut for me. Taking that role would have been a way to get all the things I wanted.
My wardrobe consists of antique clothes, many of my designs, plus shoes and shirts from Brooks Brothers and Paul Stuart.
I wrote poems in my corner of the Brooks Street station. I sent them to two editors who rejected them right off. I read those letters of rejection years later and I agreed with those editors.
In the 1960s, my father chose to introduce Italian-style clothing into a world that was filled with boxy Brooks Brothers suits. So if you were dressing in his clothes in New York or California, you were breaking a rule. And my mother, Risha, who is still living, has always been an activist. I don't think my mom has met a cause she doesn't like.
I started rocking and rolling when Guns N' Roses came out. It wasn't until Garth Brooks came around that I really got back to country. He made it fun again. To me, in country music, the rigor mortis was setting in and it just wasn't fun anymore. Garth brought everyone back over to country and made it cool again.
I didn't know anything about running gear when I started out, but after trying a few shoe brands, I've discovered that Brooks are my preferred shoes.
Preston Sturges is one of my favorites. I learned about dialogue and timing from him - louder, faster, funnier. But I do love Mel Brooks.
And I had a big opportunity with Richard Brooks, The Professionals, which is really a magnificent movie.
One does not read a poem by Gwendolyn Brooks with hopes that it will grant him a career in engineering; he does so because poetry helps him see something in the world that he might not have seen before.
At MIT, in Professor Rodney Brooks' lab, I was involved in a project, led by Anita Flynn, to build robots using techniques similar to those used in building silicon chips. We got some silicon micro-machined motors to move a bit, but this didn't lead to an actual product.
