I try not to violate what came before me and to leave lots of wiggle room for those who will follow.

When I got my first glimpse of Hugh Jackman as Wolverine, my breath caught. In that single instant, he was Wolverine.

You can read a dozen different textbooks or how-to manuals that will tell you the basic rules of what makes a story - a beginning, a middle, and an end.

Lord of the Rings, I think, is far and away the most brilliantly done stuff.

In these litigious times, if you're a beginner, it's becoming harder and harder to get your work to the people who might actually be able to hire you.

When someone writes to tell me something I've written made them laugh or cry, I've done my job and done it well. The rest is all semantics.

I try to find what makes even the worst, most despicable character sympathetic at his or her core.