Some people see me as dissecting my characters in some kind of heartless, coldblooded, analytical way, when in truth making these movies is a passionate, intensely emotional experience for me. I'm detached from the characters only to the degree that I have to be in order to write honestly about them.

One thing I want to say: I don't like victim stories and I don't write them.

Artwork can be a portal, a kind of rethinking and reseeing of the world as we live it.

Narcissism and self-deception are survival mechanisms without which many of us might just jump off a bridge.

At eleven I was at the peak of my creative powers: I was writing stories and playlets, putting together poetryprojects. I was absorbed by my 'work.' At twelve I was no longer reading or writing, just counting off days and checking them off. I was interested in survival.

I love working with actors. If you cast the right person in the right part at the right time, they make you look like a better writer and director than you really are.

That said, be mindful, to someone who's never seen any of my work, it's just a movie with actors. So it's only those who of course know the earlier work that will see something is afoot, so to speak. But I don't want to intellectualize.