I married a Jewish lady, and we're raising our son Jewish, and since I'm not Jewish the whole thing is just a mystery to me. I leave it to her, actually, because it's just a great mystery.

I suppose there must be some way in which I'm compelled to show some side of myself - or of people - that's paranoid and fraught and beleaguered and downtrodden, just as Tom Cruise wants to show that he's terrifyingly upbeat and terrifyingly heroic all the time.

Academia is a rarified culture, especially an Ivy League academic background.

Well, you know, when people say stuff about you, it's always really flattering. But does it mean anything to me? It's not really real to me; there's no reality to it.

I'd like to have permanent time off, really. The goal is financial security and permanent time off, basically.

I definitely had a top-notch education.

I never thought I would have any particular career in movies at all.