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If I could have lived as an actress in any period, it would have been the 1920s - I would have loved to have been part of that speakeasy era.

When I started, I was a theater actress, and there were roles that I couldn't imagine not playing, like Rosalind in 'As You Like It.' I used to think I would die if I could play that. But then I started doing movies, and I had children, and I moved to Los Angeles. And now I kind of can't remember what those roles would be.

I'd always envied actors who got to play real people or got to do research. I've always just had these scripts where, I mean not in a bad way, but it was right on the page.

For most of my career, I've played roles that were written for other actresses.

Acting's incredibly enjoyable, but sometimes it doesn't feel quite enough. I've also written a script about the life of Eleanor of Aquitaine. This will make me sound like a female Kenneth Branagh, but I can't think of anything nicer than directing myself from a script I wrote.

I never wanted to become an actress because I'd read great literature or seen great Shakespeare. It was more just wanting to understand what the people were really like, why they said all the strange things they did.

I didn't want to be an actor. I wanted to design historical movies like 'Ben-Hur'. I saw this as my life.

I love thinking of movie stars who could play the characters in the books I write.

I think I have been stereotyped as an action director in Hollywood, so all I got were the action scripts.

I have been waiting around to get the right script and the right director. For example, in the past, if a Hollywood director came to me with a script and wanted me to play a character, and she was a stereotypical Asian woman who gets into a fight and gets killed off quickly, that didn't seem to have much interest for me.