Often you see a famous actor who says they produced something, when all they did was claim to have an idea at a dinner party and make three phone calls.
Ethan HawkeWell, there's a great Marlon Brando quote that to do something well you have to spiritually marry your director. You have to be making the same movie they are in that you have to try to help their imagination be better, and more full, and more fully realized, but you can't have a different imagination because then you end up - and you see this a lot in movies - where it feels like they were making five different films.
Ethan HawkeAnd the best films feel like a fist punching you in the solar plexus and all elements of the filmmaking process - the acting, the design, the cinematography, the music, is all working to one end.
Ethan HawkeThe script [of Regression] wasn't the draw for me. It was largely Alejandro [Amenabar] and his way of talking. To hear him talking about the script was way more interesting than the script. He wrote it, and so, English is his second language. It's an interesting thing. I've had that before. I was directed by Alfonso Cuarรณn before, too. It's always interesting when you're being directed by somebody like that. So much of directing is about communication, and finding the right words, and what it means, and how to convey certain emotions and ideas.
Ethan HawkeIf you can channel the best part of you that is bigger than yourself, where itโs not about your ego and not about getting ahead, then you can have fun and you arenโt jealous of others. You see other people's talent as another branch of your own. You can keep it rooted in joy. Life is long and there are plenty of opportunities to make mistakes. The point of it all is to learn.
Ethan Hawke