It's not necessarily how many minutes you're on screen, it's the material you have. It's more important what it is you have to do than the amount of time you're there.

I don't think I'd be a good director because people would ask me, you know, "What is it? What's going on here? Where should I put the camera?" Or, "What's my motivation?" And I would say, "Do whatever you want!"

I think that a good movie creates its own world, and that world needn't refer to anything that's real. If it's consistent, if it's entertaining, if it's interesting, it justifies its being there.

When videotape came so a lot of movies that I do have a kind of afterlife in video. Things where movies that I do would come and go; they still come and go but you can go rent them and see them on TV.

I play so many villains and strange, troubled people. I don't have that kind of life. I live in the country. I've been married nearly 50 years. I have a cat.

Is typecasting really a problem?

Growing up in New York is like living in a horror museum because there are so many strange people walking the streets and riding the subways. You learn to develop a tough front if you live here, just in case you get into any kind of trouble and you need to talk your way out of it.