When I felt like an outsider, movies made me feel inside my own skill set.

The only thing that gets me back to directing is good scripts.

The age doesn't really matter to me as it seems to matter to other people. A lot of people think that youth or age is the total sum of your knowledge about anything, and it's absolutely untrue. I think I might have even known more five years ago than I do now.

There's been more written about Lincoln than movies made about him or television portraying him. He's kind of a stranger to our industry, to this medium. You have to go back to the 1930s to find a movie that's just about Abraham Lincoln. I just found that my fascination with Lincoln, which started as a child, got to the point where after reading so much about him I thought there was a chance to tell a segment of his life to to moviegoers.

I did 50 takes on Robert Shaw assembling the Greener Gun on 'Jaws.' The shark wasn't working, so I just kept shooting to make the production report look like we were accomplishing something and to keep cast and crew from going crazy from boredom. It was a strategic indulgence.

I get that same queasy, nervous, thrilling feeling every time I go to work. That's never worn off since I was 12 years-old with my dad's 8-millimeter movie camera.

I dream for a living. Once a month the sky falls on my head, I come to, and I see another movie I want to make.