I think I initially started inventing characters in my songs because I didn't want to write directly about myself. Also, as a kid, I loved all the character names in Beatles songs, like Eleanor Rigby and Lovely Rita and Mean Mr. Mustard and Maxwell and Rocky Raccoon.
I learned the power of radio watching Eleanor Roosevelt do her show. I used to go up to Hyde Park and hold her papers. I was just a messenger, but it planted the bug of radio in me.
The library of my elementary school had this great biography section, and I read all of these paperback biographies until they were dog-eared. The story of Eleanor Roosevelt and Madame Curie and Martin Luther King and George Washington Carver and on and on and on.
How rude would I be, walking around and saying: 'Hello. I'm Eleanor Mondale. My father was vice president of the United States. Treat me differently.'
When I am spotted somewhere, it means that my characterizations haven't covered up Eleanor Parker the person. I prefer it the other way around.
Until feminists started wailing about the female's passivity, submissiveness, and something called 'victim status,' I had no idea women were such doormats. My childhood was populated by Eleanor Roosevelt, Amelia Earhart, Pearl Buck, Marie Curie, Clare Boothe Luce, and the Duchess of Windsor.
Until Eleanor Roosevelt, there was only one or two First Ladies in all of American history who made an impact, who people could even have recognized or identified. And it's really only been since Jackie Kennedy that there's been this idea that the family life of the president is such a central thing.
Eleanor Oliphant isn't me or anyone I know. Of course I've felt loneliness - everybody does - but Eleanor and her experiences are fictional.
I'm not comparing myself to Bobby Kennedy by any stretch, but he was opposed by the liberal establishment, too. Eleanor Roosevelt was the biggest opponent to him running.
Acting's incredibly enjoyable, but sometimes it doesn't feel quite enough. I've also written a script about the life of Eleanor of Aquitaine. This will make me sound like a female Kenneth Branagh, but I can't think of anything nicer than directing myself from a script I wrote.
