To be creative you must create a space for yourself where you can be undisturbed... separate from everyday concerns.

On movies, I like to involve the cast in the writing of the script. I like to have a rehearsal period, after which I do the last draft, which gives me a chance to incorporate anything the actors have come up with during the rehearsal period, so I'm very inclusive as a writer.

My compulsion to always be working has become less strong and my current business is purely down to this enormous alimony. If I wasn't doing this I'd be making documentaries about wildlife and other subjects that interest me.

If life were fair, Dan Quayle would be making a living asking 'Do you want fries with that?'

When you've only got few days of rehearsal before you're in the studio, it's wonderful to start off with people that you have good, friendly, tolerable relationships to start with, for the simple reason that you don't have to spend 24 hours figuring out how sensitive they are, and can you give them a line reading, or how do you have to give them direction.

When I was a child and I was upset about something, my mother was not capable of containing that emotion, of letting me be upset but reassuring me, of just being with me in a calming way. She always got in a flap, so I not only had my own baby panics, fears and terrors to deal with, but I had to cope with hers, too. Eventually I taught myself to remain calm when I was panicked, in order not to upset her. In a way, she had managed to put me in charge of her. At 18 months old, I was doing the parenting.

Some actors, I think, want to feel that they are as creative as the writer. And the answer is, frankly, they're not.