'The Elephant Man' was hugely enjoyable to do. I thought the one stage, when Chris Tucker did the first makeup and it took 12 hours, I thought they'd actually found a way for me not to enjoy filming.

People say you never retire in this [film] business and I say, well, not until they retire you.

Very broadly speaking, you can put directors into two areas: One for whom you work, and the other with whom you work. And I prefer the latter, for obvious reasons.

I have lots of favourite memories but I can't say that I have a favourite film.

I think one of the things that is important, for me, though a lot of people would disagree with me, is that you be founded in theater so that you understand what an audience is, what kind of an animal it is and how to play with it. How to have fun with it, how to sympathize with it, all the things that an audience is. I don't think you're going to find that out unless you do theater.

Anything which retains interest is optimistic. When the characters become disinterested, it's pessimistic. Does that make sense?

Once you've started to dig a hole, you can't get out of it.