“I try to cast really good actors and give them a chance to do their very best work, give them as much time and space as they need.”

If I ever woke up with a dead hooker in my hotel room, Matt would be the first person I’d call.

Studios are used to have an investment in you, an actual, literal investment in an actor. You paid them some money, you had a contract with them and you were almost like a commodity.

It doesn’t matter how you get knocked down in life, because that’s going to happen. All that matters is that you gotta get up.

Sometimes the people we meet change us forever.

There’s a lot of romance to sort of living by your own rules and sort of not subscribing to what society tells you to do, but society pushes back pretty strongly, so there’s a lot of compromise that goes with that.

I’ve never held myself up particularly high when I had movies that worked, and I never held myself all that low when I had failures.

I like to think that if I were gay I would be out. Rupert Everett-style.

Directing is monumentally complicated and it’s a function of all the time you pay to it. I think it would be great to do a movie I’m not in, I could just eat Fritos and just say, ‘yeah, it’s good!’ Some day.

Sometimes I get insecure about being a real director because I look at the great directors, and they have such command. But maybe that keeps me critical of myself. Maybe it keeps me moving forward.

People ascribe a certain kind of silliness to the movie business. Everybody feels like, “In the movies, they do crazy stuff.”

A lot of my shows in the past have been more theatrical than others, but you really get the bug for it when you direct on stage.

The best cure for a hangover is something one straight man can’t do for another straight man.

Nobody goes to a movie and watches the script. There is a lot of other stuff going on.

It wasn’t my childhood fantasy to work with Truffaut or be in obscure films. I like Midnight Run better than I like The Bicycle Thief. It was films like Die Hard and Bladerunner that made me want to be an actor.

I’ve seen high and lows. When things go well that doesn’t make me feel like some genius. Nor will I allow the next disappointment to make me feel like a complete failure.

Yes, I’m going to be the President of the United States. You know why? You think you can get chicks by being in the movies? You can really get chicks by being the President.

Nothing in nature is by chance. Something appears to be chance only because of our lack of knowledge.

A hopeless man sees difficulties in every chance, but a hopeful person sees chances in every difficulty.

The more decisive we become, the lesser the chance of saving our species and this planet from all the harm we have done.

If you fight with all your might, there is a chance of life; where as death is certain if you cling to your corner.

If you’ve never tried, how will you ever know if there’s any chance?

Everything existing in the universe is the fruit of chance and necessity.

Success is neither luck nor chance. 

It is not like I have gone crazy, I just don’t want to take any chances. You never know what could happen.