The more successful the villain, the more successful the picture.

Voyeurism is a director’s job description. It’s an artist’s, too.

I started out as a writer and a director. I started acting because I wanted to know how to relate to the actors. When people ask me what I do, I don’t really say that I’m an actor, because actors often wait for someone to give them roles.

Rewriting the negative beliefs you have learned is the essence of becoming the director of your life.

I myself am a Buddhist, not a Christian. But I cannot help but think that if Christ ran a public establishment, it would be open to all, and He would be the last to refuse service to anyone. It is, simply put, the most un-Christian of notions.

Being a writer-director can sometimes make you incredibly blinkered.

I auditioned for Ted Bundy and the director Matthew Bright and we really hit it off. He cast me as Bundy’s girlfriend.

I’ve learned a lot from Clint [Eastwood], who’s an extremely economical director.

I’m shy to call myself a director still. When someone says, ‘What do you do for a living?’ I don’t know if I’ve earned that.

The biggest thing I’ve noticed with some of my favorite directors is their gift of sticking a bunch of strangers in a room together and making them comfortable and making them into a cohesive group. There’s magic involved, because you don’t know why anybody would pick this group of people.

Larry Kasdan is a great director.

[Martin Scorsese ] basically works just like any other director. You work the scene, you try to find what’s best in it and make it work. That’s what it was like.

You know, I became a director out of necessity. I was writing comedies, and I couldn’t find anybody to deliver it correctly.

When you can find a strong character and a director that does want to protect the integrity of all characters, female and male, then you have a good deal.

Television is certainly a writers-led medium. They’re the ones who are there, they’re the ones that are conferencing or whatever, with directors coming and going.

I just adored Peter Medak, the director. He’s such a character, but he was so much fun. Some directors come in and they truly get angry about things.Peter was still in a fantastic mood. He’s a delightful person. He threw a big party at the end of the pilot, which was so sweet. And his wife is an opera singer. He’s just a very warm, crazy beautiful individual.

Working with [Robert] De Niro taught me a lot about being an actor’s director.

If it’s stage, the two most important artists are the actor and the playwright. If it’s film, THE most important person is the director. The director says where the camera goes.

The biggest mistake in student films is that they are usually cast so badly, with friends and people the directors know. Actually you can cover a lot of bad direction with good acting

We make a contract within ourselves as actors or directors or writers about how much of ourselves we let into projects. You can actually figure out before you work on something how much blood you will have to let emotionally.

The FBI director’s probably spent a great deal of pressure to go either way – you know, to have said something, to not have said something. And, you know, he made the decision this was the right way to go. You know, I’m not going to second guess him without knowing all the information related to the investigation.

I want to be fulfilled creatively as an actress and get to be in roles that are meaningful and impactful. I hope the same thing for myself as a director, one day. I want to make things that have an impact on how we look at the world.

People are mystified by it and so they kind of think, the acting community thinks they’re gonna be replaced by CG characters and animators think they’re gonna be replaced by performance capture (and) a lot of directors, particularly European directors, who have no experience of it.

You have to have the essential pleasure of making a movie. It’s such a huge factor and adventure for a director because you really are the leader and the captain.

If you have the right actors and you can give them the freedom to explore, you’ve done a lot of your work as a director.

I’m a good actor in that sense for directors because I always do what they say.

I’ve worked with very few directors who’ve asked of me what I asked of myself.

I always think that a director who knows about the technical side, but cares about the acting performances and casting as well, is ahead of the game.

I am working as public relations director for the Tour de France and maintaining my farm.

Wong Kar-wai and Ang Lee are two Asian directors I’m really fond of.

‘Drive’ came to me because the casting director knew my manager and called and said, ‘You’ve always talked to me about Albert wanting to play the heavy. I think he should read this.’ My ears just perked up.

It doesn’t matter if you work with an Oscar winner or if you work with an unknown actor. There is always a collaboration between the director and the actors, and you always have to listen as the actors have to listen to you as a director.

I think that I’m a better speechwriter than my speechwriters. I know more about policies on any particular issue than my policy directors. And I’ll tell you right now that I’m gonna think I’m a better political director than my political director.

You can’t see any movie nowadays really without it having some sort of CGI treatment, albeit whether it’s a creature or an environment, something like that. To make a point, sort of poetically in that case, but clearly it was a drama and how do you approach it? Well, I think what you’re supposed to do is what the text dictates. What you bring to it and everything you need to know should be there, and pay attention to your director.

I did a great show Off-Broadway called Leave It To Beaver Is Dead that was at the Public Theater in New York. It was written by Des McAnuff, who’s an illustrious director now, and it starred… Well, I was in it, Mandy Patinkin, Dianne Wiest, Saul Rubinek, and Maury Chaykin. It was an amazing show. But it was definitely ahead of its time, and people didn’t quite get it.