If we put the camera on ourselves, our friends and neighbors, we'll come up with some scary stuff.

I felt, if I'm going to take on some of the most overdone material, which is men and women and affairs and betrayal of friends, I had better have a new take on it. I think my films come from a desperation not to be boring.

I was very careful to cast guys who were very good-looking and very fit and who had a certain sense of privilege about them, because with that sense of privilege comes contempt.

The future is now. It's time to grow up and be strong. Tomorrow may well be too late.

There were certain things that I watched, and I screened a series of period films as well, not because I wanted to copy those, because I wanted to be different. “Far from the Madding Crowd” was one I looked to because I thought it looked so good. “Doctor Zhivago.” Unrequited love is always a great thing. “Tess” was something I looked at, I thought Polanski got the period right.

And I've got some screenplays and plays ready to dip into when I need to.

In a relationship you have to open yourself up.