It's hard not to get a big head in the film industry, there are people on a set paid to cater to your every need, from the minute you arrive until you go home. It's kind of strange, but not unpleasant.

It seems that whatever we do is somehow beyond reproach - murder, rape, drunk driving - as long as we go on a TV show and apologize.

When you're in a movie, they treat you like you're four years old and give you whatever you want.

I'm a big believer in therapy. I'm in therapy in real life. I think anytime you can bitch and moan about your own life to someone who really doesn't care that much, and can give you an objective opinion about what you're going through, I think that's valuable.

I'm interested in doing movies I wouldn't normally be interested in doing.

I realize I'm a very lucky man. I love what I do, I love films, TV and theatre, and the fact that I'm able to make a living at it staggers me.

It's hard not to get a big head in the film industry, there are people on a set paid to cater to your every need, from the minute you arrive until you go home. It's kind of strange, but not unpleasant.

Before I start directing a show, I try to spend a few weeks hanging around the set, getting to know the crew and talking to the actors about how they like to work. Who is fussy? Who is left-handed? Who wants to go home early, and who is the perfectionist?

But I've always felt that the less you know about an actor's personal life, the more you can get involved in the story in which he's playing a character. And I don't like to see movies where you know about everything that happens behind the scenes. I can't engage in the story if I know what's going on in the actor's head.

Directing has only increased my admiration and respect for what it is that actors do.

I did a film called 'Fort McCoy,' based on a true story of one of the few internment camps during WWII that was actually in the United States.

I don't want to see the zipper in the back of the monster suit. Like everybody else who goes to the movies, I want to believe the monster is real.

I have a love/hate relationship with just about all technology in my life. My first typewriter in particular. I had a helluva time putting new ribbon on it.

I have several dogs and several cats who aren't really mine. In fact, they think that I am theirs. I'd like to have some goats and chickens, but I travel around too much.

I realize I'm a very lucky man. I love what I do, I love films, TV and theater, and the fact that I'm able to make a living at it staggers me.

I think violence, cynicism, brutality and fashion are the staples of our diet. I think in the grand history of story-telling, going back to people sitting around fires, the dark side of human nature has always been very important. Movies are part of that tradition.

I was up for Michael Corleone in 'The Godfather,' but, as I was only 10 at the time, I think Mr. Coppola made the right choice. The Julia Roberts role in 'Pretty Woman' held a bizarre allure for me. But, it's silly to look back with regret.

I'm a gentleman, if nothing else. It's taken me years to become one, but finally I have a sense of propriety.

I've been pretty lucky - or slothful - in that I've never been a 'career builder.' I take the jobs that come along that feel right, and that's left me fairly open to all genres, really. But with 'Caprica,' the complex, dark and very smart script was the draw.

It just seems to me that the world's kind of a mess, and the more messy it gets, the more interested I am in escapist fare. Having a good time is something that isn't about the war in Iraq or the Asian flu or the Kyoto protocol - things that are horribly depressing to consider in our real lives. I'm eager to get away from them.

It seems I have a hard time being attracted to someone unless I respect what they do on some level. Otherwise, I would feel disdain for them. Which is not always pleasant in a relationship. Sometimes it's fun though.

Let's not kid ourselves here, robots already run most of our world. We'll be their butlers soon enough.

My first film as an actor was 'Fast Times at Ridgemont High,' a glorious experience that spoiled me for future films.

My perfect day is constantly changing. Right now, it would be to lie around in a hammock reading with a portable phone and a table of food next to it. I would spend all day there. And that's all that I can possibly come up with on the spur of the moment.

Recently I was directing an episode of 'Glee' and I lost my cell phone - and I didn't have time to buy a new one for three weeks. Well, the first few days I was anxious as hell, suffered the delirium tremens, didn't think I could make it through, etc. Then something kind of curious happened - I began to feel great.

TV, in particular cable channels, has assumed the role of independent film.

There's a strange sense of accomplishment in making an independent film. Everything's against you; there's no time, and even less money - you bring a bottle of glue, chip in twenty bucks, and hope you all make it through the day. If you manage to finish it and it actually turns out to be pretty good, it's thrilling.

Things happen to everybody in the course of a lifetime. Relationships end, people die, tragedy befalls everyone. So everyone has this wealth of experience, and the older you are the more you have to draw on.

You know, you grow up with the image of John Travolta being super cool - 'Saturday Night Fever,' Brian De Palma, handsome young god... he, in reality, is a very silly man. And I mean that in a good way. He'll walk around the set talking in little weird voices, making people laugh.

My perfect day is constantly changing. Right now it would be to lie around in a hammock reading with a portable phone and a table of food next to it. I would spend all day there. And thats all that I can possibly come up with on the spur of the moment.

My best film composing experience was with Elia Kazan.

I was lucky enough to occasionally break out of that racist situation that prevails in the Hollywood film production community. But it was racist then and it will always be that way. It will never be otherwise.

'Batman' took 10 months to film, and by the time I stopped working on it, it took a long time before my English accent came out again. I was actually having to try for it.

Luck is everything... My good luck in life was to be a really frightened person. I'm fortunate to be a coward, to have a low threshold of fear, because a hero couldn't make a good suspense film.

I still feel that a movie has to attempt to say something - even if it fails miserably. But I've sort of given up on believing that I'm going to change the world with every film I choose to act in.

It's the difficulty we had with Mr. Bean, actually, when it went from TV to film. You certainly discover that you need to explain more about a character.

To make a documentary is one thing, to make a feature film is quite another.

I mean when the play was on in New York I was starting to get film offers coming through, and since the film's come out I get offered more than I used to, but it happens incrementally.

I think it would be very boring dramatically to have a film where everybody was a lawyer or doctor and had no faults. To me, the most important thing is to be truthful.

I like doing them and they're ridiculous and the actors can improvise a lot, and they don't have to be really realistic characters that hit a very specific tone as in a feature film. They're really fun, I want to make more of them definitely.

One of the most interesting aspects of the film project was collaborating with so many people - directors, filmmakers, and writers - over a five-year period. I learned that there are two components to this.

The best thing I can think of would be to create a union between something as beautiful and powerful and wonderful as Hollywood films and a criticism of the status quo. That's my dream, to make such a German film.

If he didn't fall in love he would have never come back near the end of the film. Because, what man is going to dishonor himself so that he comes back in front of the man that took a woman away from him... and warns her to save her life?

Robert Altman's Nashville is my all-time favorite film because it covers all the bases - it's original, moving, and has something to say, but also funny and incredibly entertaining.

I never see a novel as a film while I'm writing it. Mostly because novels and films are so different, and I'm such an internal novelist.

I have a movie coming out called Spun, which will be at the Toronto Film Fest.

Well ironically my last three roles have all been a mother. One was a Canadian film where the baby was taken away because she is a drug addict, in Irish Jam I play a mother to a four year old. I think in the future I'll be able to handle the role with a lot more depth.

And when you see it the first time you put the film together, the roughest cut, is when you want to go home and open up your veins and get in a warm tub and just go away. And then it gradually, maybe, works its way back, somewhere toward that spot you were at before.

A good film script should be able to do completely without dialogue.