You can work on a movie for years, and you won't know until you show it to an audience for the first time if it makes any sense to them at all, if they're touched, if they find it funny, so it's endlessly exciting, because failure is just right there all the time, and your chances of success don't rise that much based on the fact that you succeeded last time.

You know, I'm a big comedy fan.

In my beginnings, those nos were ever-present-even today, those nos are ever-present-and it's the workaround. I always found a workaround for people who turned their back to me. It's a way of being persistent that makes them take notice.

'The Night Of.' I pray there will be more.

The only thing I knew in the world as a little kid was comedy. And no other kids in my school cared about it at all. There was no one to talk about it with. You know, we're in a geek culture now where comedy is so giant. I'm one of the people that, you know, works on Funny or Die. And there is just a giant culture of comedy nerds. But back then, I was alone, and I had a little confidence about it because I felt like, this is my thing, this is the only thing that only I know about.

Humor is his defense mechanism, so that would allow me to talk about some serious subjects, but get a lot of hilarious jokes in.

I hear Amy Schumer on Howard Stern, and I think, "I wish there was a movie that starred her, because she's so interesting," and then at some point I go, "I guess I have to get involved, because it's not happening right now. Maybe I should help try to make that happen."