Now that I have kids, I'm probably more overprotective than I've ever been. My wife's nickname for me is "red alert." I sometimes check just to see if the kids are breathing. But I try not to be a helicopter parent.

Our problem is civil obedience

It's an objective fact, that if you want to solve some of these huge, kind of bigger problems of extreme poverty, you have to include the women. They're the ones who will get it done.

He's famous for being obsessive about details.

Fame is really strange. One day you're not famous, and then the next day you are, and the odd thing is that you know intellectually that nothing in the world is different. What mattered to you yesterday are the same things that matter today, and the rules all still apply - yet everyone looks at you differently.

It's very frustrating [ to work under director's control], not just because you're getting rejected constantly, but also because you're at a time in your life where you have an enormous amount of creative energy, and there's no way to express it. That's why a lot of people get into drinking or drugs or whatever.

I've passed on a lot of huge-money jobs. Money doesn't enter into the decision-making. If I do a big blockbuster, it's about how big an audience you'll get and where you can take them.