I don't want to work on a musical if I'm not the lyricist.

With studio work, I'm always the bottom man on the totem pole.

We have this myth that if you work hard, you can accomplish anything. It's not a very American thing to say, but I don't think that's true. It's true for a lot of people, but you need other things to succeed. You need luck, you need opportunity, and you need the life skills to recognize what an opportunity is.

I'm not saying people shouldn't apply themselves and work hard. You do have to try to make your own luck. But I know people firsthand who worked incredibly hard, who were really smart, who never got into trouble, and still didn't get a break.

Having deadlines helps because people are constantly breathing down my neck, and tapping their toes waiting for pages. So I just have to work nine to five. If I didn't have deadlines then I might be more of a golden hour kind of guy, writing from eight to noon and calling it a day, but that's just not the way I work right now.

From a young age, I was rubbing elbows with a very different kind of person and social class, and I felt a lot of tension and conflict in my identity because of that.