I've always believed in the goodness of people. I teach in prison. They all said, don't do it. Carry a gun, take Mace. Are you kidding? I guess, they're around so many criminal elements that they fear for.

I don't know how I made those movies. I went out every single night, I smoked pot every single day. I drank. We did everything, but I never became a drug addict or an alcoholic. Other friends are dead, many of them. So many people in this retrospective...in Female Trouble, almost everyone is dead.

Fifty years seems like a good anniversary. Even after I'm dead, how much better could I get than this? I mean, it's great, I'm not dead, so I get to see it.

I learned that people like my work because I praise things that others don't like.

If I died tomorrow I've accomplished what I set out to do in my life. I enjoy making my movies, I enjoy doing what I do. I have a nice life.

New York was the last place that my movies caught on. I didn't make underground movies in New York, and in the 1960s, they were very snobby about that, because the whole scene was here.

Aren't maids the ultimate art critics?