I went to LA because my parents were there and somebody asked me if I wanted to be in a movie. It was easy, it wasn't easy to do, but I fell into it. I made a living as an actor for a long time, but I didn't think of myself as an actor, I thought I was a writer.

Preston Sturges, who wrote The Palm Beach Story, said screenplay writing is architecture. That's why it's so rare to read one that's any good.

I don't mean to talk so much about screenplay writing. Who wants to talk about screenplay writing? I've taught it and I felt like a charlatan because what I was teaching I probably couldn't do.

I tried to write things, but they were so ridiculous and stupid and impossible and I had not a clue what they were, so that delusion went on for a long time. Maybe it's still going on, only somehow I sucked some people in. It was a long time of writing things that didn't make sense in the real world, and I'm embarrassed about them now in a jocular way.

Hollywood's always saying, "Yesterday!" and scares you to death with all that deadline and yelling and impatience stuff.

I went to LA because my parents were there and somebody asked me if I wanted to be in a movie. It was easy, it wasn't easy to do, but I fell into it. I made a living as an actor for a long time, but I didn't think of myself as an actor, I thought I was a writer.

I wonder if these editors, why they're not writers sometimes, because they know so much about writing.