People ascribe a certain kind of silliness to the movie business. Everybody feels like, “In the movies, they do crazy stuff.”
My father has positional vertigo, and if he flies he gets really dizzy, so he has to drive out to California, which he does a couple times a year. We talk, but we e-mail mostly.
But when I felt like I had something to prove? Then I got up early every morning and worked all day long. I didn’t know if I had any more talent than anyone else directing, but I knew I could work hard at it, and so I did.
Not that it entirely matters: There is a perception that all actors make their movies. A lot of people assume you’re responsible. George Clooney told me actors get all of the blame and all the credit.
I like the incongruity of how in Iran, these people we think of as being revolutionaries or fanatics or whatever are just as aware of Luke Skywalker and Darth Vader as our people are back home.
No actor forgets the times he couldn’t get a job. I think everyone doing this operates from that fear. You don’t want that momentum to stop when you get it.
I have definitely noticed that I care less about certain things. Other actors are like: “You can’t do that”, or “You can’t do this. This will position you in the wrong way.” That’s not my thing. And obviously so, because you can see I don’t craft or cultivate my career.
The first Star Wars movie had come out in 1977 and had become this huge phenomenon with all the toys and everything – it just kind of swept America.
Sometimes I get insecure about being a real director because I look at the great directors, and they have such command. But maybe that keeps me critical of myself. Maybe it keeps me moving forward.
I recognize that Hollywood is not about seniority. Often it’s not even a meritocracy. It’s about what you did yesterday. You have a couple of misses, and suddenly it’s impossible to find a hit. So the swings are gigantic. But I’ve always understood it as such, and navigated it as such.
You have to be kind to people. Treat them decently. There’s no excuse for not.
I don’t think the government should be involved in any way in people’s bedrooms or lives. With so much hatred and unpleasantness in the world, why would you want to get in the way of people who love each other marrying each other?
I’m in the worst place you can be. I sell magazines and not movie tickets.
I like that best as I am so hairy.
On the day he had colonic irrigation: ‘I feel I lost my virginity that day in so many ways.’
When you hire great actors, you’re lucky, so you just try to create an atmosphere where they can succeed and relax and take risks. You’re happy that you get to watch them at the monitor and that your name is on the director’s chair.
Well I’ve never used that phrase before, but yes she is bootylicious.
The best cure for a hangover is something one straight man can’t do for another straight man.
No matter what you’re doing, if you’re trying to make a movie, you need to be working with people that are really good and who make you better.
Just because a lot of people know something nominal doesn’t make it important. A lot of people know what a pencil sharpener is, but that doesn’t make it the most important invention of the 20th century.