I suppose some studio executive would say it's death for a comedy if people aren't all laughing in the same places, but I find with my movies that people laugh in very different places. I can't control it.

How you start the movie is critical. And how often you feel that there's no reason for how it's starting.

That's the nice thing about collaborating with someone: Your work becomes a conversation.

When I make a movie, I have both a specific and vague, amorphous dream idea of what the movie is going to be. Of course, I don't actually know what it's going to be, but I'm still striving to get to some place with it.

I've always felt some kind of connection to people who are kind of over-smart. People who over-think things to the point of some sort of paralysis, and I think that certainly can be me on any given day.

I find a lot of writing happens when you're not actually at the computer. So I carry a notebook.

Nothing that I've turned down do I feel like I should have done. Because I've generated everything I've done, I've never really considered doing something that I haven't originated myself. There are definitely things that I've been brought that someone else made good movies out of. But it's not a path I've followed, so I don't have regret.