I try to build relationships with the actors, at least to some degree beforehand, whether it's phone calls because I'm from Seattle or all of us meeting in person at some point, which is ideal if at all possible before we get on set together.

I just really feel so grateful to Sundance because I've always been an artist and I've never been able to make a living at being an artist until Sundance.

I like being able to just turn the microscope on a small number of people, get to know them, drop into their lives for a period of time.

It's just not enough time on set. That's my favorite time. I live for that time on set. I feel like that's when I'm stretching and flexing my muscles and learning how to direct better.

We're all flawed, and we all make mistakes, and we all have weaknesses. And those are the kind of people I want to see onscreen, the ones that feel like real flesh-and-blood human beings and not the weird, whitewashed, Hollywood stand-ins for people with the rough edges sanded off that I can't connect to because they just don't resonate with me.

Although humor is present in every one of my films, it has always been used as a way to make the darker, heavier stuff in my stories more palatable. I never set out to make 'Humpday' a comedy.

I'm drawn again and again to relationships between people who really, really want to connect and just can't get out of their own way to do it.