You think you're in a place where you're all 'I'm thrilled to be gay, I have no issues about being gay anymore, I don't feel shame about being gay,' but you actually do. You're just not fully aware of it. I think I still felt scared about people knowing. I felt awkward around gay people; I felt guilty for not being myself.

You can choose who you want to be the hero [in Hard Candy], but youll be second-guessing yourself -- theres just no right answer. Our society is obsessed with finding good and finding evil, but I think were all capable of anything.

Love, the beauty of it, the joy of it and yes, even the pain of it, is the most incredible gift to give and to receive as a human being. And we deserve to experience love fully, equally, without shame and without compromise.

I'm not good at watching stuff that I'm in at all. I should stop. I shouldn't watch something for the first time with a room full of people at Sundance. It's not a good idea.

This world would be a whole lot better if we just made an effort to be less horrible to one another.

It's really crucial to achieve that balance with a film like this, cause it is unique and witty and then there's the tendency to force that. It becomes contrived and I know the feeling like, give me a fork that I can stab in my eye in those kinds of movies.

I think people who work and being alive and paying your bills and feeding your kids is hard. It's hard to have the space. Quite frankly, I'm in a privileged position to think about things, to read about things and to educate myself about things. A lot of people just don't have the time.