I Was Trying To Figure Out What

If You Create Something That Is Asking For People To Respond As They're Going To Respond, You Have To Allow Them To Respond As They're Going To Respond. Some Of The People Are Going To Be Uninterested And Some People Are Going To Be Mad For Some Reason, Which Is Their Business. That's Just The Way The World Is.

I Think Now That I've Tried Directing, I'm Not Interested In Doing Adaptations Anymore. I Could Do An Adaptation Of Someone Else's Work That I Would Write, But The Idea Of Taking Someone Else's Material Entirely Doesn't Interest Me. One Of The Things That I Found Really Helpful, At Least In My Mind - And I've Never Discussed This With The Actors Or With The People I Work With - Is That Being A Neophyte In Directing, I Feel Like I Have A Kind Of Authority Simply Because I'm The Writer As Well.

When I'm Writing, I'm Trying To Immerse Myself In The Chaos Of An Emotional Experience, Rather Than Separate Myself From It And Look Back At It From A Distance With Clarity And Tell It As A Story. Because That's How Life Is Lived, You Know?

I Have A Lot Of Anxiety About Medical Things For Example. I Don't Think I'm Particularly Good At It, But I'd Had The Practice When I Went Into Shooting Synecdoche. It Can Be Somewhat Gratifying, Too, Because I Don't Have That Relationship With Other Adults Where I Need To Comfort Them Or They Come To Me For That.

I Studied Acting At Boston University. I Was In The Theater Department There. Somewhere In There I Decided That Wasn't What I Was Going To Do And I Went To The B.f.a. Film Program At N.y.u.