When you're trying to get laid, everything's great, but once you've been with someone eight years and the future is not finite, you have time to sit and really examine every little thing that irritates you.

I'd be fine to make movies and have them never come out. But you have to deal with the business side. You can't get too emotionally invested, because again, you've got no control. There's going to be some huge film out that everyone goes to, and it probably won't be mine.

I have a lot of films that I haven't gotten made, and that continues to trouble me. But someday, some way or another, I think I will. It's all about timing. There's a moment when you're hot and studios will make your next film, and then there's a moment when you're really cold, and they couldn't care less what you want to do next. That's when you have to recede and make lower-budgeted films.

I'd like to quit thinking of the present as some minor insignificant preamble to something else.

I think casting is really important. Finding the right sensibility for the right part is an art in itself. If you're off there, you make it harder on yourself as a director. And it's fun to work that out with the actors. I don't think there's any magic to directing actors. It's very instinctual. Working with actors is really one of my favorite creative moments of the whole process, and the most fun, because it's collaborative. I spend a lot of time rehearsing. I'm very rehearsal-oriented, probably because I have some background in theater. I like knowing what will work beforehand.

The worst thing is that you used to be able to show interesting films on campuses. Those places are all gone.

All I've learned is that you need the studio system sometimes, if your budget is a certain size, and other films you can do independently. When I think of a studio, I generally think of distribution. Since I'm a director, I have a similar creative experience on every film I do, because I can control that. But then it's a different film, I think, as it reaches the public, depending on the way it's marketed. I don't know. I haven't learned much of anything. Sometimes you need them, sometimes you don't. Sometimes they want you, most of the time they don't.