I like storytelling, and I feel more confident as the years have gone on about my ability to do that.

I've had a great career. I've had a great life. I am truly blessed by my working experiences.

Quentin [Taranino] will say, "We've got it, but we're gonna do it one more time. Why?" And then, the entire cast and crew chimes in and says, "Because we love making movies!" He is a person who celebrates this form of expression, and it is evident in his movies, his conversations, his extensive knowledge about the history of what we do, and the actors and crew that he assembles.

The life of a character doesn't just exist between action and cut.

I have a bit of a bucolic kind of upbringing, and so I certainly bring an amalgamation of different people that I've met over the course of my life, especially before moving to Los Angeles, so I guess my childhood was my homework in a lot of ways for Harlan County.

Acting is a child's game. It's your willingness to suspend one reality and substitute it for another. That reality lives and breathes in your imagination. The actors that I want to be like exercise that way of thinking, and that's kind of what I do.

I think Hollywood sees so many parts of America through a very narrow prism. The South is no exception. And those stereotypes, while sometimes true, are exaggerated for me to the point of boredom.