Ethan Hawke

You know, we'd bought into the dream that, you know, we were going to be whatever teen icon we were thinking of at the time.

And it died a quick and salty death, my dream.

And I went back to high school and put away my dream of being an actor.

It seemed like it was this isolated, almost like choose your own adventure book or something, where I...

got to see what Hollywood was like, but then have it denied.

And it kind of like putting your hand in a flame.

It was not a good feeling when it was over.

And...

Then, you know, four years or so went by and I graduated high school and I was off at college and I heard about these auditions for a movie called Dead Poets Society.

And I hated college.

I was miserable.

And I thought, I'll take the bus in and I'll go on one of these open casting calls again.

And if I get the part, this is what I decided, if I get the part, I'll do that.

If I don't get the part, I'll join the Merchant Marines and be like Jack London.

That was my fantasy at the time.

I remember calling my sister and saying, all right, there's seven parts.

This is how dumb I was.

I was like, there's seven parts.

If I don't get one of those, I must suck, you know?

So, which is not true at all.