Creative freedom is an imperative for me, but it doesn't really exist in a Hollywood game.

They say now in America that final cut doesn't mean anything. As Harvey Weinstein said to some film-maker, 'You can have final cut. I'll open your film in Arkansas.'

I grew up in a very small town which is remote even by Indian standards. I always dreamed of the world.

I am an independent film-maker first and foremost. I have always cut my own cloth.

It gave me a lot of pleasure and pride that 90 percent of the crew for 'Monsoon Wedding,' and most of my film, are women. We get the work done, you know, much lesser play of ego... And I really believe in harmony, I believe in working in a spirit of egolessness and that the film is bigger than all of us.

We all know the power of film; we all know there's almost nothing more powerful than to see people on film that look and talk like you, like we do.

I've loved 'Vanity Fair' since I was 16 years old. You know, we're all colonial hangovers in India, steeped in English literature. It is one of these novels that I read under the covers at my convent boarding school in Simla.