I do honestly think that if women were running the world there would be more investment in peace, because basically as women we do not want to see our children killed. Maybe I am completely idealistic, but until we see women in equal positions of power in the world, I just think that we are doomed.

In my own experience of male and female directors, people have a much, much harder time taking a direct command from a woman. It's somehow very difficult for people.

My own sense of well-being and purpose in the world. That comes from studying the world feelingly, with empathy in my work. It comes from staying alert and alive and involved in the lives of the people that I love and the people in the wider world who need my help.

Well, it has to do with very deep things, because it might be that imagining yourself as a girl is a diminishment. But it is something that when I made "The Devil Wears Prada" it was the first time in my life, 30 years of making movies, that a man came up and said I know how you felt. I know how you felt. I have a job like that. People understand.

I follow no doctrine. I don't belong to a church or a temple or a synagogue or an ashram.

My advice: Don't waste so much time worrying about your skin or your weight. Develop what you do, what you put your hands on in the world.

Having been let out of the barn once, I know I wouldn't be happy if I were home all the time.