The fact that a TV star can become president should be old news since [Ronald] Reagan, and old news since the Nixon-Kennedy debates - which the famous story, whether or not you agree, is that if you listened on the radio, Nixon won; if you listened on TV, Kennedy won.

When people say to me, 'Why are you so good at writing at women?' I say, 'Why isn't everybody?' Obviously there are differences between men and women - that's what makes it all fun. But we're all people. There's a lot of good writers who are very humanist, but still manage to kind of skip fifty-five per cent of the race. And I just don't get that. Not to be able to write an entire gender? To me, the question isn't how do you do it? It's how can you possibly avoid doing it?

I have a desperate longing to have a desperate longing

Let's put it this way: If a raccoon can carry a movie, then they believe maybe even a woman can.

I love to write. I love it. I mean there's nothin in the world I like better, and that includes sex, probably because I'm so very bad at it.

I think it's always important for academics to study popular culture, even if the thing they are studying is idiotic. If it's successful or made a dent in culture, then it is worthy of study to find out why.

I don't know video games.The last video game I played, apart from Dance Dance Revolution at Jeremy's house, which I was very good at - Scarlett [Johansson] and I will always have "Billie Jean" - was Super Mario Kart on the Super Nintendo. I'm from the Dark Ages.