When I was diagnosed I didn't know how epidemic cancer was. You find out that everybody you know is touched by this disease.

Most movies don't have the ability to find an audience. So the movie plays out very quickly in a lot of theaters to get the biggest gross. So that demands that we make things that are hits before they open. So they have to have the elements, they have to be franchises.

In my world, the hero always defeats the villain, the boy always gets the girl, and cancer is no more.

In some ways, the most rewarding thing I've done were the two times that I did the Oscars, particularly the first time because it was really like the ultimate "Let's put on a show," with every great movie star in the world available.

What's great about making movies is the sort of additive process of bringing people together and having an idea and watching the idea be added to and at the end you have this thing. It's really a collaborative experience.

For me as a filmmaker, I do the projects I'm really excited about.

I was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2004.