“The one thing for sure is, I don’t ever want to waste a movie. I don’t ever want to waste effort.”

For my money, I don’t think there’s been a better comedy than ‘Kung Fu Hustle’ in a lot of years. That movie just knocked me over.

I have certain beliefs about how people should treat employees and how companies should be run, but I was really surprised though this process to learn that those beliefs are actually good business.

I got the sense that Alabama is a place where people don’t want handouts and don’t much care for people talking out of the side of their mouth.

It’s one thing to mess stuff up and break stuff, but [Borat] is really pointing out the ideology of America.

Old man with an old phone. That’s never not funny.

It’s crazy, but even at funerals, people will get huge laughs.

I grew up with a single mom who was a waitress. We were on food stamps.

We punch mirrors and we explore our darker selves. No, it’s just an amalgam of all newscasters that we grew up with. Sort of like before there was cable, when these people were like gods.

David O. Russell is probably my favorite filmmaker. He’s not only a great director, but he’s also a great writer.

I’m just a giant film fan, so I love action movies out of all kinds of movies. As a film geek, it’s amazing to be able to shoot this stuff.

As for movies, what’s great about comedy is that if your movie gets laughs and makes money, you have freedom.

I always give myself a little part in every movie.

We get so much information during the day that doesn’t really tell us anything.

There’s a lot of things you can’t control. But you can always be a pro.

I would never call myself cultural elite, but you might be cultural elite.

I don’t think there’s ever been a moment in history where that, as an artistic message, has played very well, because people in their hearts know that’s terrible and a lie.

If you think you can grasp me, think again: my story flows in more than one direction, a delta springing from the river bed with its five fingers spread.

One summer I worked at Estée Lauder, and I really enjoyed the whole creative process.

A life I didn’t choose chose me: even my tools are the wrong ones for what I have to do.

When you ask women what’s the one thing they wish they had more of, they always say time.

There is no ‘the truth,’ ‘a truth’–truth is not one thing, or even a system. It is an increasing complexity.

I’ll fight both of them in one night, and I bet it won’t go 12 rounds.

Friendship is that virtue by which spirits are bound by ties of love and sweetness and out of many are made one.

This is one of the ways in which women’s work and thinking has been made to seem sporadic, errant, orphaned of any tradition of its own.