The camera is your way to see what you want to see - it's an extension of the director's fantasy. I'm executing my personal fantasy, whether it's a fantasy of pleasure or of pain and fear.

A male director doesn't come to situations the same way that a female director would.

Sexism is real and it persists in film and television. I've seen female directors openly undermined by male cinematographers in front of the entire crew

Having kids is a full-time job. And I don't know any woman who isn't constantly fighting between the exquisite selfishness required to be an artist and this exquisite selflessness that's required to be a parent.

I'm a civilized person who obeys the law and is pretty easy to get along with, but I'm more complicated than that. I use my work as a way to get all that other stuff out and experiment with feelings and ideas, and the forbidden. That's just part of my process, I think, to identify something forbidden. That's what lures me into wanting to do the work, write the story down.

Something you discover as a writer is that actresses who are successful are incredibly smart. For some reason, there's this myth that if you're a beautiful actress, you're not bright, you're a puppet. But it's completely the opposite. These are people with a finely tuned sense of story, and who are also strong and articulate. You have to be, to be a woman holding your own on TV and film sets.

In documentary, which is the only thing I'm really very familiar with, women are very easily relegated into a producer role.