Quotes on La

People are released from prison so unprepared. They give you $200. We call it gate money. And you have to pay for a bus ticket back to L.A. You get off the Greyhound bus, downtown Skid Row, and you're supposed to make a life from that.

L.A. runs on optimism, enthusiasm and flattery. I think you can go a little bit crazy. I've heard people say there's a limit to the number of years you can stay in this city without going slightly mad. It's just too damn sunny in every dimension - weather-wise, socially and professionally.

Even after I became involved in theater and involved in TV and film, I had this sort of idea that Hollywood was off limits. There was something about L.A., the mystique of it and fear of it.

I watched movies, obviously, just like anybody else, but there was nothing to make me think, 'I'm going to go to L.A. and become a movie star,' or anything like that.

In L.A., we listen to everything. If it's banging, it's banging - we don't care where it's from.

As soon as I came to L.A., things immediately shifted for me. I was now actually here with the people who were making the decisions; I wasn't out in New York sending in tapes to L.A.

I've conducted the Boston Pops! Imagine that! Me! Maya Angelou! I've sang and danced at La Scala!

L.A. is so big that if you don't actually live in Hollywood, you might as well be from a different planet.

I went to school at night in L.A. to brush up on my engineering while I applied to the astronaut program. I really did not know if I would get in. It was the year after the Challenger accident in 1987.

In Paris and later in Marseille, I was surrounded by some of the best food in the world, and I had an enthusiastic audience in my husband, so it seemed only logical that I should learn how to cook 'la cuisine bourgeoise' - good, traditional French home cooking.

The Bill of Rights is not an a la carte menu.