It's important for me to take very famous, well-known people and not have them play themselves and not have them be seen as themselves.

In the writing phase, normally I try not to envisage any particular actors because I like to let the characters sort of reveal themselves in that process.

I'm a veteran, and I come from a family of veterans and people who served in that war. And the stories that I heard were a hell of a lot different than the movies that I was seeing, so I wanted to make a movie about the people that were really there.

Actors are insanely competitive and they hold back on each other. They are like magicians and none of them want to show their tricks.

I'm all about real drama, real performance, and real people, so my twist on this is: I'm creating a family, a brotherhood here. I'm creating a very real chemistry and I have this incredible ensemble of actors led by Will Smith, who are basically playing dimensional characters with lives and souls.

I'm one of those big believers that the movie comes together in the way it's supposed to be and that movies are fated to become what they become.

The most terrifying thing in my life is a blank sheet of paper.