June. June Mathis. No, no one else, ever. She gave me my start. She first, of all people, believed in me.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
To play June, I had an immediate connect with her background and culture. We grew up with the same religion and shared a lot of the same values of family and spirituality. But I was really so inspired by what a modern woman she was.
Around 14, I was turned on to Shania, Reba, Merle Haggard, Garth Brooks, Trisha Yearwood... and I've followed it ever since.
When I was about 7, I fancied Anna Chlumsky; the girl from 'My Girl.'
I took a clown class at NYU - that's where I met June Diane Raphael, my writing partner and best friend.
I showed up in October 1946, part of an early surge that would become a great nationwide baby boom. My sister Kathy was born a year later.
My dad, he believed in me. My first year was hard for me. I came to the States with myself, and no one came with me.
I've never looked forward to a birthday like I'm looking forward to my new daughter's birthday, because two days after that is when I can apply for reinstatement.
I've come to believe that whoever I am didn't start on December 14, 1946, and isn't going to end on whatever that mysterious date is in the future.
My best moment of 2011 would definitely be the birth of my daughter six weeks ago, on September 25.
One week before my 17th birthday, I had a blind date with June Rose, a television actress on network soap operas, a model, and a regular on the popular Dick Clark's Saturday night 'American Bandstand' show from New York. We were married five years later, one week after my graduation from Columbia.