I got a GED when I was 21 and it doesn't mean anything to me now. I'm still a high school dropout and I like the fact that I've had a good life without that.

I don't think it's a contradiction to find painfulness funny.

Years of my life were lived knowing that I'd get a book out of them one day.

If you can laugh with your friends over something, you own it.

I love the Army-Navy surplus store Surplus Value Center. They have really good long underwear and multicolored bandanas, cool camo jackets, and really, really scary-looking knives. If you're into that sort of thing.

A lot of the people I know connect through working. We're all so ambitious. Sometimes my friends will say, 'I want to hang out with you.' And I just go, 'Well, let's do a project together.' That's the only way I can.

You just have to say over and over again: 'I am a director.' Nobody gives it to you. Nobody anoints you.

As much as possible, I put my family first.

I like to create a community where people want to come and have a good time and do their best work.

I was running the show on 'United States of Tara' and 'How To Make It In America' where I could say, 'Okay, I'm in charge of everything now.' But it still wasn't my show.

I noticed that people were craving a way of reinterpreting tradition and of being Jewish without joining a synagogue.

The more horrible the truth that you admit, the better you connect. You have to tell the truth.

I am beyond excited to share 'Transparent' with the world through Amazon. They've been so supportive through this incredible process.

Getting into Sundance is a certain sort of passport to a level of anxiety I've never experienced, even having had a baby in the NICU for a week. For about ten minutes, you're a world-class director. Then you become an entry-level, harried, low level concierge with absolutely no juice.

I just feel like content is content; people want to see it resonate.

To me, it wasn't 'Star Wars' that shaped me; it was more 'Mary Tyler Moore' and, nowadays, 'Louie' and 'Girls.'

You must speak the vision of your project in a way that convinces people to pay for it. If they won't pay for it, that is the artist's fault. It is my fault. It is your fault. It is not the executive's fault or the world's.

Perfection would be something that you see in 'Architectural Digest.'

For me, when I'm not working, the day goes by so fast. I never have enough time - getting a manicure, getting a pedicure, getting my workout in, making sure that I ate healthy. Those things can become treacherous to the mind.

On some sets, if a helicopter goes by, what would normally happen is that somebody would go, 'There's a helicopter. Stop.' I'd never stop for a helicopter. I am always trying to make sure that the machine is in service to the actors.

Most people privilege the technology, almost as if actors are in service to the machine.

It's a struggle every day to get people to invest financially in portrayals of women that aren't satisfying to straight white men.

Whether you're writing television or movies, at some point you're going to encounter a male executive or investor who's going to say, 'I don't like that woman. She's unlikable.' And often, it's literally for being a regular human woman as opposed to an attracting human woman.

I think, because of the Internet, we're not looking at the very, very narrow channels for distribution that there used to be.