But my sense in talking to people when I travel is that the film business is not that dissimilar from a lot of other businesses.

I was lucky that I was getting exposed to a lot of different kinds of films, and I was liking them all. So it seemed logical to me that you could - as in the style of the studio directors of the 30s and 40s - jump from one genre to the next, with the same satisfaction.

I have no shame in making music that maybe, if you listen to it long enough, you'll realize you've heard this or that part of it before. I'm still very excited by an amazingly written song, so that's really the thing that I work on when I make records with people.

There are three major social issues that this country is struggling with: education, poverty, and drugs. Two of them we talk about, and one of them we don't.

To me the director’s job is to leave it in better shape than you found it, literally.

Anytime you've got something that can take you into the political realm then you've opened up the conversation a lot.

There's definitely a way of thinking and a way of being in the South that has its advantages and disadvantages.