We moved, and there was a golden era in the '40s when we were so conscious of who we were as Australians.

No one was creating and I always wanted to be created on.

Mostly, I'm in the very enviable position that no one dictates what I do.

And dance is wonderful because dance is so immediate.

I'm interested in people who can take the movement somewhere.

If the year 2000 can help us move into the future, that's fine, but I am afraid that people see it as a full stop and that one can take a big breath afterwards - you can't.

We moved, and there was a golden era in the '40s when we were so conscious of who we were as Australians.

I look at the dancers and I get the inspiration for the work from them.

Dance is so joyous.

We also tour nationally and internationally.

It's not a company of exponents of my style.

I think the Olympics could help us reach more people.

There's a line of dancers waiting to get into Sydney Dance Company.

Normally our season is seven weeks in the Drama Theatre and four weeks in the Opera Theater.

It's the emotional trigger points that are important to me because I know if I could believe in the characters and try and imagine how they felt then I'd be able to do something quite honest.

For me it was really important to get the essence out of the music for the story and not, sort of, press the music into the service of the whimsical telling of it.

But I also wanted to give them an intelligent emotional journey, without having to suspend reality - to be able to look at those characters and see reasons for the relationships and why what happens happens.

I wanted to give people - which is fairly bizarre considering my whole life is contemporary dance really - I wanted to give people a really fulfilling sense that they had seen a white classical ballet - in a very pure form.

And currently, there are four to five new works in the pipeline for upcoming celebrations such as the Sydney 2000 Olympics, Australian Federation, my 50th Birthday, and Sydney Dance Company's 25th Anniversary.

I think it requires a bit of honesty, Swan Lake.

I don't think people we'll miss the fact that SDC is way up there and that our profile is high.

I'm thrilled at the moment because our audiences, you know, they... the demographic is 50% male.

Yes, Carl Vine stuck around. He's now number one composer for choreography.

SDC has a great reputation for putting live music on stage.

I always figure I have this tree and there's always some green fruit that's not ready to pick or blossoms that are ready to flower; there are always some ready to drop off too.

Sydney is a very good market for us - we have a very strong following here.

I'm in the position to pick the cream of the crop.

We can't afford big symphonies but we commission works that sound rich and symphonic because of the nature of the instrumentation and the people we work with.

I actually build my dreams around the dancers I've got in my company.

I mean, I think in the early days we were pretty... pretty British in our entertainment leads.

Your life is a reflection of how effectively you balance potential and kinetic energy.

Peace, above all things, is to be desired, but blood must sometimes be spilled to obtain it on equable and lasting terms.

Lifeboats are decked out on the sides of a ship waiting for when disaster strikes, faith on the other hand is a part of you for whenever.

Tenacity is when you follow your heart, when the whole world is screaming to get back into your head.

To think that my heart and my words and my music saved somebody's life, it takes a while to just sink in with me. But it proves to me that music is powerful.

On stage, I need to be seen from the back seats. So, I dress more colorful and vibrant.

The fruit does not fall far from the tree

If you're put on a pedestal, you're supposed to behave yourself like a pedestal type of person. Pedestals actually have a limited circumference. Not much room to move around.

Every choice before you represents the universe inviting you to remember who you are and what you want.

People see my body and ask me what I do to work out. I play a lot of basketball, so I'm constantly dribbling and running up the court. I take a basketball with me everywhere I go!

The hardest part of writing 'William Shakespeare's Star Wars' was probably the sheer amount of iambic pentameter and tiptoeing around certain scenes I knew would be hot-button issues for 'Star Wars' fans.

For the most important decisions in your life trust your intuition and then work with everything you have to prove it right.

I was lucky that I started very young, since I had a very clear idea of what I wanted to do. But my father is very conservative, and he never considered fashion to be a real career but something I could pursue as a hobby. He wanted me to be a doctor, and at one point, I thought of becoming a plastic surgeon.

There are people who can do all fine and heroic things but one - keep from telling their happiness to the unhappy.

A lot of people are like, 'Don't read your news clippings.' I read them every day. Anything negative somebody said about me, I find it and use it as fuel.

One thing that sticks in my mind is that jazz means freedom and openness. It's a music that, although it developed out of the African American experience, speaks more about the human experience than the experience of a particular people.

When you die, make others cry because you left something behind not because they lost something.

Law is a bottomless pit.

I just want to keep going for broke, making bigger and bigger things like 'Lord of the Rings' until they kick me out of Hollywood. I just want to do the biggest thing I can.