What I do usually is read the book first, for pleasure, to see if my brain starts connecting with it, as a movie. And then, if I say yes, I read it again, only this time I take a pen and, inside the book, I say, "Okay, this is a scene. I don't need this. I'm going to try this. I'm not going to take this." And then, I use that book like a bible and each chapter heading, I write a menu of what's in that chapter, in case I ever need to reference it. And then, I start to outline and write it. I get in there and it starts to evolve, based on having re-read it again.

When I was young, I had two older sisters, and since I was the youngest in my family, my mom took me around with her all the time. I was forever with her when she was having coffee in the middle of the afternoon with her three sisters. And they would talk about men. I absorbed a lot of that.

. . . I felt that making her one-dimensional would be an insult to the audience, and also not as interesting. All destructive people have an inner side to them, and the more three-dimentional your characters are on screen the more compassion you can open up in an audience . . .. To me, that involves the audience more, it stimulates them and asks more of them.

I tend to believe, when you're in a relationship, if you don't fight, it's not a real relationship. You have to have arguments and tensions, otherwise I don't believe it. My mother always said, "If you don't fight, you can't have a marriage. You have to fight for each other. If you don't know how to fight, relationships tend not to last."

I tend to believe, when you're in a relationship, if you don't fight, it's not a real relationship. You have to have arguments and tensions, otherwise I don't believe it.

Women have to take more control of their careers. They can't just wait to be cast in a film.

If I can make a living as a writer, I can do anything.