I don't move until an actor is happy, but it was very important to me as a so-called "first time director" to keep the machine moving. It was especially important to me to keep it moving and not be some kind of precious writer-director.

Martin [Campbell] is very energetic and precise. He'll on the set like four hours early with a flashlight and I thought, well, I'll certainly try to be very neat about my script like Martin, which I wasn't, but I'm not going to do that bit with the 4AM and the flashlight. I'd love to be able to say I was nervous, but I wasn't. The only time I ever had anxiety it turned out to be asthma.

Doing crime films...maybe it's to some extent a matter of taste. Certainly my first novel had a criminal element and was about the similarity of criminals and artists. Pretextually, it was sort of a money bag thriller. But it was aggressively not what it seemed to be. It was kind of Duchamps.

In Boston terms I was everyone and no one, with no social investment, no social insecurity, sort of Imitation of Christ in one hand and The Education of Henry Adams in the other, and because I was part of nothing I could observe everything without having anything personal invested in the findings.

I didn't have anything to do with selecting IFC. I don't have anything to do with distribution, or business, or marketing, but think it's a good choice by Graham, and perfect for London Boulevard. It gets the picture straight into a dialog with the public, and it doesn't set the sights too high. They're very hip at IFC, and they get the film. The cineplex hasn't done film any favors as an art form.

I hate doing anything in offices. I either want to be out in the world or in my own environment - and it should be your own environment that you work in.

For me, film has been good because I'm able to work at top crack, working at something I love to do, in the only literary form in which you can still make money. There are no famous novelists, not as novelists used to be famous.