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Before 'Gremlins,' I was a normal person, then within two weeks of the movie coming out, I couldn't walk into a store without people turning around and staring. It's exciting and also scary because everyone starts telling you how amazing you are.

'Gremlins' is one of those eternal movies that stands the test of time and that everyone loves and knows.

Getting the role in '300' saved me. I'd been out of work for 11 months after 'The Brothers Grimm.' Once the film came out and didn't do so well, the director Terry Gilliam blamed me for absolutely everything. It was pretty appalling, and I had started to wonder if I'd ever get another job again when I was asked to audition for '300.'

If you stop and think about who was in the 'Lassie' movies, it's difficult to think who was in them, apart from Elizabeth Taylor. You remember the dog, not the people! So if you're going to be in a movie, and it's called 'Gremlins', it's going to be about Gremlins, and what people are going to remember are the Gremlins.

I'd been an actor in high school, and when I got to college, it was all about film.

The gremlins are clearly the ones have the most fun in the film, trashing the town, going to the bar, smashing things, etc. It's all gleeful chaos, which makes the movie fun.

I think one of the reasons 'Gremlins' lasts and some other films don't is because I don't think the movie has a whole lot of dated things - sure, the cars, my hair, and few things here and there that date the movie - but it takes place in a sort of everytown, in a sorta non-specific time, and that gives the movie a timeless quality.

I had to get a job, and of course, the job was 'The Godfather.' That made me be something I didn't know I was going to be. I became a big-shot director.

I was in Woody Allen's Stardust Memories in 1980. It was only a bit part and I didn't get to speak but I felt that I was in a real movie and heading where I had always wanted to be.

With 'Greenberg,' I wanted to make a movie about Los Angeles... my great love for it and also the way that I felt not at home and alienated there.