There's also some element of coming of age during the Reagan administration, which everybody has painted as some glorious time in America, but I remember as being a very, very dark time. There was apocalypse in the air; the punk rock movement made sense.

I was only in one of the John Hughes films, and I never saw the other ones. I didn't understand them. I kept hearing a really hip 40-year-old person talking in teenagers' mouths.

You just try to get the best jobs that you can get. Sometimes I produce my own movies, so that's your own sort of vision. That helps things. I don't know what it is. Probably just circumstance. I've definitely been aware of the fact that I want to do different things.

I never really saw myself as an activist but at some point the activist is the only moral position to take.

The film is not a success until it makes money. It's only good when there's a dollar figure attached to the box office.

The elderly have so much to offer. They're our link with history.

Usually I do everything reverse. I practice something in movies and then I try it in real life.