I remember in film school, when we made shorts, you'd sit there and screen them with your peers, which has its own flavor, because everybody's so competitive and evil, and it's a really nasty environment.

Starting writing is stressful and scary and hard, but also, it's just like going to the gym. You're just stiff and weird, and you can't do it as well.

Focus group was helpful in the way it always is when you make movies, especially with anything funny. You can find the right edit or the right beat. In terms of cutting and rhythm, I think it's essential to screen your movie before you lock picture.

That's what all these studios do: They recruit people who've seen certain films. It's this weird, fake science-y thing the studios call a "tool." That's a very scary process, because it can be used in odd ways. But then there's focus groups and stuff like that. I was so nauseous and terrified, and then you get the cards: very good, good, recommend.

Obviously, once you're finished, you're like, "Okay, I have to make this a movie now, and I need people - bodies to play these parts, and actors to bring this thing beyond a script." But when I was writing it, I wasn't thinking of actors; I was really thinking about creating three-dimensional characters.

Producer Ed Pressman had a book about Diane Arbus - it's the only biography that exists - and there had been many Diane Arbus scripts. Many. I don't even know how many over the years. And it's sort of a cursed project, for lots of reasons. There's probably some pile somewhere of all these weird attempts, all these portraitures that can't get made.

I did watching my films with an audience at the beginning when we went to Sundance and we screened The Savages there. I watched it, and I was just praying to God it worked, because we weren't even finished. I was just hoping it worked, so half of it was just, "Phew."