Great critics do not explicate a text; they describe it and then report on what they have described, if the description itself is not the criticism.

It was a pity that movies and live TV left New York for Hollywood. London theater, movies, television - until (Britain's) money ran out - were always better than ours since the city was the political capital of the country, as well as the artistic and literary one. In L.A. we've always been slightly sealed off from real life. It's no accident that two of our most interesting directors, Woody Allen and Bob Altman, are more or less settled in the real world.

I have no social position and I stay away from what is known as society as much as possible.

I might become an ascetic, live in India. A little rice is about the best I can do now.

The greatest pleasure when I started making money was not buying cars or yachts but finding myself able to have as many freshly typed drafts as possible.

A huge number of Americans still believe that Saddam Hussein was responsible for 9/11. You have a people that don't know anything about the rest of the world, and you have leaders who lie to them, lie to them, and lie to them.

The American press exists for one purpose only, and that is to convince Americans that they are living in the greatest and most envied country in the history of the world. The Press tells the American people how awful every other country is and how wonderful the United States is and how evil communism is and how happy they should be to have freedom to buy seven different sorts of detergent.