You know, Arabs are critical of United States foreign policy, but they also associate the U.S. with democratic principles and opportunity.

I have actually been very fortunate to be able to make films on my own credit card without having huge funders behind me dictating how the story should be told.

Al Jazeera is demonized by the United States, yet in Egypt my father would be watching it.

There are these very poor communities on the outskirts of Cairo called Mokattam, where a lot of the garbage collectors live. I used to volunteer there, doing health and education work when I was younger and living in Egypt.

I'm interested in characters that are complex people.

If you can laugh with somebody and relate to somebody, it becomes harder to dehumanize them. I think that most of what we are constantly bombarded with in terms of media leads you to a creation of 'the Other' and a dehumanization of 'the Other,' and it's very much an us-versus-them conversation.

I've discovered I can't make a film about people I dislike.