I guess I like a lot of directors. Or at least I try to.

I guess I like a lot of directors. Or at least I try to.

Many filmmakers pretend that they never see anything, which has always seemed odd to me.

And I took a long time to appreciate Lynch.

And the fact that I see so many films really seems to amaze certain people.

When you see the films of certain young directors, you get the impression that film history begins for them around 1980.

Cocteau is someone who has made such a profound impression on me that there's no doubt he's influenced every one of my films.

And Twin Peaks, the Film is the craziest film in the history of cinema. I have no idea what happened, I have no idea what I saw, all I know is that I left the theater floating six feet above the ground.

For me, the film has to be incredibly bad to make me want to pack up and leave.

Their films would probably be better if they'd seen a few more films, which runs counter to this idiotic theory that you run the risk of being influenced if you see too much.

Whereas with Sirk, everything is always filmed. No matter what the script, he's always a real director.

You know where the best McDonald's is? Dubai. Because they have regulation on the meat, so it's really, really good.

If you want a dancer's body, dance. Dance aerobics is my favourite cardio. It's very frustrating if people think you have to become a dancer to do it - you don't.

So I, for one, didn't feel alienated by what happened in 77.

I think I draw most inspiration from writers like Richelle Mead and filmmakers like John Hughes. They both really understand the experience of being a teenager and how insistent and intense everything feels, but they're also smart, savvy, and fun.

I did not want my tombstone to read, 'She kept a really clean house.' I think I'd like them to remember me by saying, 'She opened government to everyone.'

As a white Australian, you're surrounded by this vast landscape you know isn't yours, so you're always intimidated. You expect to vanish up a mountain or get eaten by the ground.

I was reading Plato's 'The Republic' at age 18, and I can't account fully the electricity that had for me.

Chocolate is ground from the beans of happiness.

I am an African. I live there and my children live there, and as far as I understand, they intend to go on living there.

No one is ever ordinary.

Although none of the rules for becoming more alive is valid, it is healthy to keep on formulating them.

It is Barack Obama who is at war with this country. Recent events prove it. This is not a cliche. It's not a figure of speech. Obama is at war with the U.S. economy.

I had been a kid that moved so much, I didn't have a lot of friends. Theater really represented camaraderie.

It does seem to produce more creative results when there are limitations. It's like in wartime with rations - people became more inventive with cooking.

A laugh costs too much when bought at the expense of virtue.

To me, music shouldn't be ego-driven. When you go out on stage and play songs, it is. But when you're sitting in a room, writing songs, it's a completely different process. It's a completely different place. It's a creative place, a musical place. It has nothing to do with who likes what.

Cowards die many times before their death.

In the '70s, the gay movement was really making strides. Huge strides. And then AIDS came along and slapped a judgment on it all and the Right Wing religious movement was like, 'See. This is why, we told you.' And it pushed back the movement 30 years.

My clothes are great for a honeymoon Theyre light and sexy colorful and pretty and not expensive.

The men I idolized built their bodies and became somebody - like Sylvester Stallone and Arnold Schwarzenegger - and I thought, 'That can be me.' So I started working out. The funny thing is I didn't realize back then that I was having a defining moment.

I learned so much more prepping vegetables than I ever did in cooking school.

We know that often holding those who have carried out mass atrocities accountable is at times our best tool to prevent future atrocities.

When I started at 'SNL,' I was lucky to start early. So now starting on 'Update,' I am the age when most people are when they start doing that. It feels like a different world and capacity, like starting over in another challenge. A heightened challenge.

Insanity in individuals is something rare but in groups parties nations and epochs it is the rule.