I love watching all sorts of different types of movies, but that doesn't mean they're necessarily movies I want to be making. I'm not sitting around saying, "Man, I'd really love to direct a western." That's just not something I'm probably going to do. But, I'm just looking to work on things that both feel professionally exciting and personally relevant.

There are just things you can explore in a movie that you can't in 22 minutes with a laugh track.

It's really hard to be poor in New York - I was really poor when I lived in New York.

I think that the mark of a great book is that it will meet you wherever you're at and you'll feel and experience something new and different each time you read it.

I remember the first day I was looking at my hands and I thought about my nails. People wouldn't really be paying attention to that, but a Civil War doctor - What would they be doing with their nails? Would they cut them really low? And Dr. Burns said, "No, they would let them grow out so they can scoop stuff out. They would use their nails." So for a while I let my nails grow. They were too long. I kept stabbing myself by accident, so I cut them down, but I was trying to be faithful to the details.

Well, I stopped drinking. That was actually a big deal. I didn't go through any harrowing rock-bottom experience. I just made a decision to stop drinking.

There's that great Bill Hicks line - the comedian - where he says, "Are you proud to be an American?" "I don't know. It's just where my parents had sex."