American movies are often very good at mining those great underlying myths that make films robustly travel across class, age, gender, culture.

I was always obsessed with finding truly researched images to add authenticity, out of that came something totally contemporary and modern. Research is very key to my process because over and over again, reality provides more interesting images than you could have invented.

I'm the son of highly functioning parents who I'm incredibly lucky to have.

Great acting is all about being in the moment, being in the present tense.

I decided to be a filmmaker when I was 12. I had utter clarity that this would be my life.

Trans stories have now entered the mainstream in this fantastic way, but the most important thing is what follows from that is hopefully a shift in the experience of trans people - so that there's more acceptance in the culture to the issues they face and more support.

I think the thumb print on the throat of many people is childhood trauma that goes unprocessed and unrecognized.