In something like 'Frank,' which is a comedy, albeit a strange and emotional one, you can absolutely put in deleted scenes, and we did because they were just funny and great, but they weren't necessary in the overall structure.
I remember a Q&A I did in Wales where there were five people in the auditorium.
I did go to cheder and was a bar mitzvah. We were members of an Orthodox synagogue, although we were not religious. My grandfather was Polish. He came to Ireland in the '30s.
I can just remember being broke, wondering if I had any talent - really wondering whether this was all a fantasy - but I had to get out there and keep trying.
Hollywood is probably the most active centre of film-making in the world, but it's also a very difficult place in which to find your voice... It was also a far more civilised industry in Ireland.
'Room' was a particularly cohesive group, crew and cast.
As with any actor and any collaborator, it's about forming a trusting relationship. And that's not that you have to get him to trust you so you can get him to do what you want. Especially with a little kid, it's about making them feel really safe, and getting to know and not treating them as a puppet to be moved around.
I'm fascinated by people who have to reinvent themselves. I did it a few times - I was going to be a physicist before I was passionate about philosophy - and I realized that one more change, and I'm going to start looking like a dilettante.
When you're shooting, there's terrible pressure, and you never switch off. Every day is like the day before an exam; it's relentless.
There was a golden era in film-making in Hollywood back in the 1970s, and although there is some great independent film-making in America, it's actually very hard to get independent films made in the United States. It's much more feasible from Europe.
I went to Poland for the Warsaw Film Festival, and it was quite an intense experience. I didn't think it would be, but it did feel quite emotional to go back to this place I'd heard so much about.
When we say 'cinematic', we tend to think John Ford and vistas and wide-open spaces. Or we think of kinetic camera movement or of a certain number of cinematic styles, like film noir.
For me, I always think of the image of sweeping out my footprints as I walk through a scene.
I don't think of myself as doing good works. It's not, 'Oh, I must give these poor people a voice.'
I always felt there was a kind of humanistic impulse in my thinking about film as well as a real interest in its formal and aesthetic properties - just this idea that it can bring you into a very intimate encounter with people.
Most of my work has been independent movies outside the mainstream system.
I was interested in the narrative of how we nurture our elite in this society: all that stuff about believing in yourself and not accepting second best. Our inner world is at odds with that.
I'm interested in discontinuities and interruptions, people having to rewrite the narrative of their lives because of sudden changes.
I am an unusual Irishman. I'm probably Ireland's third most famous Jewish son.
People say that soundstage sets never quite look like reality. But actually, they can. They can be as real as you want as long as you pay attention to the kind of detail that is given for free in a real place.
