With any period piece I think the thing to do is forget that it's not contemporary when you're writing and to have the characters feel as much as possible like characters that you would know.

The sandstorm, which I think is an absolute triumph, could have been awkward. It's sex in a car, so who knows. And I think the rooftops look fantastic [in Allied].

It's always good to have a world that people don't know about - a world that hasn't yet been done. It's like treading on fresh snow. You're the first one there.

I love cooking and kitchens.It's just a great world, and I wanted to explore it. You see the façade, the outside, the public part, and then you just walk through one door marked "Staff Only" and you're in a different universe.

I think people are drawn to characters that break the rules. I think there is something about a good person doing bad things for what they consider to be a good reason. Then the battle is on to almost prove to the audience that it's justified. How far can you go with that? How far can that character go before people won't accept it? Trying to walk to edge of that line is a challenge.

[2015] it's a time that there's a clash of ideologies, similar to the Cold War. I think that a story like this has been waiting to be told, and I think it's a fresh look at the whole earth-shattering business of the collapse of the Soviet Union.

The story [of Allied] stayed with me, like a stray dog outside the office, waiting.