Quote

As a director, you see something in someone; you know it's there, you just got to go get it. You do that with any actor. That's your job.

As a director, you have to know what actors are doing. You're the one telling them what to do. The actors' job is to come prepared to the set, but sometimes, if they're beginning actors or people who are non-actors, you have to teach them how to act.

The acting is something that will always be a part of my life, but the writing gives me a lot more creative freedom. You're a pawn in somebody else's chess game, whereas as a writer and as a director, you get to call the shots. And that's very thrilling.

You grow up loving movies, and your first instinct is you want to be an actor, because those are the people you see in the movies. But when you actually become an actor, you're like, 'Oh, wait, this is actually only a small portion of the storytelling. If I want to really tell a story, I'd want to be a director.'

You can be playing a line some way and the director wants you to change that, or you can disagree. But I always think that the creative conversation between director and actor is what leads to good work.

You spend enough time on set as an actor and it's great when a director was at some point an actor or understands acting. They're able to finesse performances out of you that a lot directors can't get.

I guess once you've been acting for a long time, you glean the great bits of good directors and the bad bits from other directors, and you know the way that you would like to be directed.

When a subject pops into a director's head, you either fit in there somewhere, or you don't. An actor is only who he is. Especially as you get older, there's not as much of a range of potentially feasible parts.

Part of an actor's job, in my opinion, is adjust to the characteristics of the director and try to understand to how he tries to work.

I think acting really helps as a director. It's just no question, because you totally understand the acting process.