The hotel and the characters under its roof serve as a microcosm for what was happening in the country during that time.

The hotel itself was something of a microcosm of the country at the time, reflecting the racial divisions in the U.S. at the time and how divided people were about Vietnam, ... It was important if you were a 19-year-old man at the time that Bobby Kennedy was elected president because his promise was to get us out of the war rather than escalate it.

We don't think about pilgrimage in this country. We don't think about meditation. The idea of taking a six-week walk is totally foreign to most Americans. But it's probably exactly what we need.

Literally, if someone says I am grounded, everyday I am at home, I actually have my hands in the ground and dirt under my fingernails. I don't have a staff to do it all for me. I still plant a seed and I'm amazed it grows.

We've lost touch and allowed technology to take precedence over organic nature. But let's not forget that those microchips in our computers came from elements of the earth.

We're a very close family and we're a very real family, and I think every real family has real problems.