I was a personality before I became a person - I am simple, complex, generous, selfish, unattractive, beautiful, lazy and driven.

. . . it is true, even people with painful childhoods. . . grow up to be more interesting people. So, there's always a positive to a negative.

Our role as artist is more controversial now because there are those, claiming the absolute authority of religion, who detest much of our work as much as they detest most of our politics. Instead of rationally debating subjects like abortion or gay rights, they condemn as immoral those who favor choice and tolerance. They disown their own dark side and magnify everyone else's until, at the extreme, doctors are murdered in the name of protecting life. I wonder, who is this God they invoke, who is so petty and mean? Is God really against gun control and food stamps for poor children?

A large part of me is pure nebbish - plain, dull, uninteresting. There's a more flamboyant part, too. Obviously.

Marlon Brando. The finest actor who ever lived. He was my idol when I was 13. He's done enough work to last two lifetimes. Everything I do, I think: Can Brando play this with me?

I love things that are indescribable, like the taste of an avocado or the smell of a gardenia.

Directing is so interesting. You know, it just sort of encompasses everything that you see, that you know, that you've felt, that you have observed.