I kept feeling like there were no parts for girl who want to play to the mezzanine.

My mom used to play a lot of super character-y parts... so I was sort of raised to be a clown.

When we did 'Endgame,' we were all hunched over and making the craziest sounds. Then I graduated and went right into auditioning for 'Gossip Girl' and things like that, where, as an actress, you're required to act from the neck up and, from the neck down. It's a presentation of your birthday-suit self.

Getting to work with Edie Falco and watching her be a quiet presence - but a very powerful presence - and so brilliant and free? That was the first person I saw where I was like, 'I want to emulate that.'

I spent a lot of time in college studying theater of the absurd and Beckett and Genet, and then I spent a lot of time after that at 'Gossip Girl' auditions, thinking, 'Wow, I really wasted my money.'

Female friendship... I think you have friendships that come and go, and then there are ones that the girl becomes a part of your bones.