The first record I bought with my own money was Rio.

People love that monkey torture.

Don't write something that is your passion project because all it will do is get the passion stomped out of you.

All studio movies are the middle of the Bell curve. The only way to do something is to do it yourself. And the only way to do that is to not take any money from anyone or take as little money as possible from anyone and that's it.

I guess I considered myself just sort of a sketch comedian, you know? Actual screenwriting hadn't really occurred to me as a viable job - I didn't really know anything about it.

The good thing about being a writer is that you don't need anything except for a laptop. You can really do your own work and if you're not manically compelled to write all the time before you do it professionally, it's probably not a business for you anyway.

Books are great for if you want to work on the craft of writing for yourself, or, you know, to write novels or indie films, stuff like that.