Fact is we went on to do other things. But we still wanted to do our success like rock'n'roll stars.

Your characters get angry at you if you speak about them and stop you from giving birth to them on the page in revenge. Real writers sit down and write. Wannabe writers sit around and talk.

Now the cigarette companies claim that they don't do that [ pay to have their product advertised in movies ] anymore, although it certainly makes you wonder a bit when an independent production like "In The Bedroom", you know, seems to focus constantly on Marlboros and almost it turns into a Marlboro ad, whether there was any money exchanged.

I changed my diet completely. You know, I'm from Cleveland, so I've always loved sausage and red meat and all of that stuff, so now I find myself not eating any of that, no red meat, no sausage. It's basically a vegetarian diet with a little bit of fish. I drink quarts of carrot juice, quarts of cranberry juice, endless amounts of water and nothing else.

There are some young women movie stars who are doing it everywhere, smoking in every movie, sometimes even with placements with a pack of cigarettes.

From a writing point of view, you now have teams of screenwriters working with a director. What's lost in the process is the power of that one heart, brain, gut and soul that makes something an original piece of writing.

I think to put death on screen where it isn't that turns it into comic book time and there I think by desensitizing an audience, you really do open the possibility that someone is going to kill.