Sometimes I think that the one thing I love most about being an adult is the right to buy candy whenever and wherever I want.

I've learned it's important not to limit yourself. You can do whatever you really love to do, no matter what it is.

As a kid I decided that a Canadian accent doesn't sound tough. I thought guys should sound like Marlon Brando. So now I have a phony accent that I can't shake, so it's not phony anymore.

All my characters are me. I'm not a good enough actor to become a character. I hear about actors who become the role and I think 'I wonder what that feels like.' Because for me, they're all me.

Falling in love is a narcissistic endeavor. You play the role of lover, and you find someone to act it out on.

Freedom is such a gift.

Show me a man who wouldn't give it all up for Emma Stone, and I'll show you a liar.

Women are better than men.

I sometimes forget to have breakfast in the morning, but when I actually buy a box of cereal, I will probably eat it not only for breakfast but also as a snack later on.

Muscles. We're talking about muscles? They're like pets, basically, and they're not worth it. They're just not worth it. You have to feed them all the time and take care of them, and if you don't, they just go away. They run away.

The theme for me is love and the lack of it. We all want that and we don't know how to get it, and everything we do is some kind of attempt to capture it for ourselves.

I've been thinking about a bank robbery my whole life.

I turned 30, and everyone told me I would feel different, and I didn't.

I loved growing up in Canada. It's a great place to grow up because - well, at least where I grew up - it's very multicultural. There's also good health care and a good education system.

I don't really have that much angst to get rid of.

I don't believe my house was haunted. I think I had an overactive imagination, and I was so convinced that those around me became convinced, too.

I think the 'Law of Attraction' comes from a rich, white, privileged perspective.

I think about death a lot, like I think we all do. I don't think of suicide as an option, but as fun. It's an interesting idea that you can control how you go. It's this thing that's looming, and you can control it.

Cars can have a hypnotic effect. You can get in a car and get out and not really remember the trip.

I danced a little as a kid here in Canada: in Ottawa at the Elite Dance Studio and at the Top Hat Dance School in Cornwall where I grew up. So I had some experience of having to learn routines.

I'm going to make a movie about 'Hey Girl.'

When I was a kid, I saw 'Rambo First Blood', and the next day, I took knives to school and threw them at everybody. So I was definitely influenced by violent films before 'Drive.'

When I was a kid, I was kind of obsessed with that movie 'Dick Tracy.' Burger King had all this 'Dick Tracy' stuff, and I collected all of it, and I had the posters, and I watched it on a loop.

That's the power of film. If it's good, it can somehow make you feel connected to even the farthest thing from your own experience.

The '70s just seemed dirty, honestly, and not in an interesting way. It's not the '80s. In fact, it's 10 less. I grew up in the '80s, so that's more of an interesting time to me.

My uncle was an Elvis impersonator - his name was Perry, and he went by 'Elvis Perry' - and my work as a wedding singer landed me a spot in his act.

When I made 'The Notebook,' the director, Nick Cassavetes, who is John's son, used to show me his father's movies.

I grew up Mormon. I wasn't really Mormon, my parents were.

It's not easy to leave your hometown and your family and your support system and come out to Los Angeles to - to pursue a dream where the odds are not in your favor.

A car is only trouble at a certain point.

I think I was always bound to become two selves, if I wasn't already.

I did what I had to do to get where I wanted to go. I had unearned confidence.

I'm attracted to films that have strong female characters because there are strong female characters in my life. That's my own reality, so it's a doorway into a world for me.

It was a strange experience, making a love story and not getting along with your co-star in any way.

Some of the styles of dance in 'La La Land' I wish I had spent time on when I was a kid.

I had my hustle. It was whatever I could do to not end up working in a factory. If I had to shake it like a showgirl, I was going to do it.

I don't know enough about manliness to define it.

I've lost perspective on what I'm doing. I think it's good for me to take a break and reassess why I'm doing it and how I'm doing it. And I think this is probably a good way to learn about that. I need a break from myself as much as I imagine the audience does.

I just sort of feel like John Hughes movies are perfect, but they're missing violence. If they just had some violence, they'd be perfect.

My home life now is mostly women. They are better than us. They make me better.

I love 'An American in Paris.' That's the one for me. Some of the visual ideas in that film are just haunting and very free.

It's interesting the kind of freedom the musical form gives you. The rules are out the window. You can get impressionistic without seeming pretentious. Because it's perceived as an inherently accessible form, it gives filmmakers some leeway.

I love being Canadian. I think growing up in Canada gives you a world perspective that I certainly enjoy.

I wish I could be Peter Falk.

I'm glad I have an outlet. I don't think I would put my aggression elsewhere, but working on the projects I have worked on, you tend to benefit personally from trying to wrap your head around the way other people look at the world.

I feel it's important to show that one thing that you do doesn't define you as a human being. It doesn't mean there aren't ramifications or you shouldn't pay for that but its not who you are.

When you meet your kids, you realize that they deserve great parents. And then you have your marching orders, and you have to try and become the person that they deserve.

If you do one good thing, that doesn't define you either. Being around the kids in the juvenile center, they were engaging, they made us laugh but they were there for doing something terrible.

If the character is true, the movie will fall into place. Or at least that's what you hope.

People don't step outside themselves and make the film they want to make, because they're afraid of the reaction. But once you get that reaction and have lived through it, there's nothing they can do to get you down.