I like to create a character where you believe, deep down, that they don't really care if they live or die. That's very liberating for the character because, if the character is prepared to die, then they can do anything. It's impossible to stop them.

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].

I'm very bad at watching anything. I'm bad at going to theaters; I can't watch my own stuff; I watch a lot of sports.

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.

James Delaney as an individual is sort of like a grain of sand in an oyster who is irritating all of them. But for me he's a creature of the time, like the industrialists who started the Industrial Revolution who extricated themselves from their class and their background

When I was probably about 10 or 11, and I found it was simply something I could do. When you're at school and you do something and you get praised for it, you think, "Oh, right, well I'll do that." From then on, I always thought I'd be a writer. I thought novels at first, and then I sort of naturally drifted into TV.

I think once those friendships, if you use that as an analogy, the friendships between the audience and the character is established, then you can start to take liberties. I believe that as this unfolds people will find the time invested worthwhile.