In a sense I've made the same film over and over again. In all of them I've asked, 'Who are we as Americans?

I subscribe to William Faulkner's' view that history is not just about what we were before but who we are now.

Wynton told us that Miles sold out, just wanted to make more money, just wanted to sell more records. I don't believe that Miles sold out but I'm not in a position to say.

It is the great arrogance of the present to forget the intelligence of the past

When a documentary filmmaker, working in the style that I do, suggests that there has been a shooting ratio of 40 hours to every one hour of finished film, that doesn't mean that the other 39 are bad.

In a sense I've made the same film over and over again. In all of them I've asked, 'Who are we as Americans?

The way I work, the interview never becomes larger than the person being interviewed.