Certain types of films will never test well. My films never seem to test well.

Dialogue that's distinctive, funny, peculiar, and specific is the main thing that makes me want to get involved with a film to begin with.

There's no choice left in America anymore. Anything that's authentic and genuine, anything that grew out of any sense of tradition, is wiped out. We're left with this bland monoculture that's swept over the whole country.

I never saw a department store Santa as a kid. My mother was afraid to take me.

I never thought in terms of a "breakthrough" film. I wasn't looking for fame or a career path into Hollywood. I was doing it for myself. I just wanted to make a film that I really loved. If other people liked it, great. But you can never guess what other people are going to like.

Because I found myself telling the story of his family to people without the visual aids that I was able to employ by filming them eventually. But I very much knew exactly what I was going to do.

Luckily, he was in the process of moving to France at the time, anyway. But if he had stayed in the States, I don't know how he would have handled that, because it was getting pretty crazy. I mean, a celebrity which he really did not welcome. And I can't blame him.