It was similar to Carl wanting The Dick Van Dyke Show to be timeless, or Fred Astaire movies seeming classic. If I always felt comfortable taking the whole family to one of my films, I knew others would, too, and that would serve me well over time. I could play many types of characters on camera, but all were, in some way, going to be variations of me, and I was conscious of who I was. I wasn’t a prude or a goody two-shoes, but I was, in many ways, still the boy my mother praised for being good, and though older and more complex, I was content with remaining that good boy.
