When we had ideas that earned there way in [Austin Powers], it began to get okay. The hook for me was 'Mini-Me.' We only auditioned one guy - Verne Troyer - and at the time I said, 'we have to get this guy, get him life insurance, whatever he needs' because there was no other way or actor to do it. It was amazing to me just to talk to him...he was Mini-Me.

We had to do the same thing here. To top that sequel was quite a task. Mike had a couple of good conceptual humour and character ideas, which got me back into it.

When something so unjust as the black list happened, [Dalton Trumbo] would come to life in a certain way.

People have an actual bias against there being some kind of popularity for political films, and when they get acknowledged, it helps keep the conversation going.

Mini-Me was the pint sized clone that was the perpetuation of Dr. Evil's own legacy [in Austin Powers]. That concept earned the sequel.

I'm pretty opinionated sometimes although my political views change all the time, too. So I'm not very zealous.

I'm not one of these directors, so far, that wants to have a whole separate director's cut of these things. So far they've turned out to be kind of the length that they wanted to be.