What destroys more self-confidence than any other educational thing in America is being assigned to some remedial math when you get into some college, and then it's not taught very well and you end up with this sense of, 'Hey, I can't really figure those things out.'
But then of course you reach a point where you have to say, I've got to figure out how this book's going to end. Otherwise, you're going to write yourself into so many dead-ends.
The greatest filmmakers are not the ones who put everything in; they're the ones who can figure things to leave out, and in doing so, invite your participation.
Most TV shows are writing the next episode while you're directing the one you're doing, and they're trying to figure out what they're going to do, and they're putting it all together.
You have to figure out who the right person is to tell the story. And often, people who are very self-aware will only sound as if they are pontificating if they tell the story.
I definitely think it exercises an interesting muscle, auditioning for bad parts and trying to figure out how to make it real. I don't know what I'm talking about now.
I think we have to own the fears that we have of each other, and then, in some practical way, some daily way, figure out how to see people differently than the way we were brought up to.
