No rock and roll ensemble, however inspired, can deliver the kind of musical variety obtainable with the resources of 110 instruments.

Once you decide that you're going to have the death of Spock, then how does that affect the other people? Why is it there? I got a lot of stick from a lot of people from the very beginning about the idea of killing Spock. Somebody said, "You can't kill him." And I said, "Sure you can; the only question is whether you do it well."

Audiences may be stupid, but they are never wrong.

The director is a bit analogous to the conductor of a symphony orchestra. It's a collaborative adventure.

I never gave my career much strategic thought. Maybe I should have.

I wrote an article not so long ago that was published in the Los Angeles Times, and I think I titled it "Movies vs. History." But I think they had another title for it. I got sort of sick and tired of seeing movies that got picked apart by people because they had taken dramatic or poetic license and I said "These people don't understand the distinctions."

The first thing that put me on the map was my Sherlock Holmes novel.