I don't think there is a single character in 'The Graduate' that is not a phony, to one degree or another, except Benjamin and Elaine, and only in the scenes when they are alone together.

I think it gets overused and tossed around in ways that aren't true. Every impressive achievement is not genius.

Nina Gold is a fantastic casting director. She's doing the new 'Star Wars' movies, but she also does 'Game of Thrones' and many of the Working Title movies, and she did 'Rush.'

Instead of candidates hiring people, like yours truly, to create campaign media that works on both conscious and subconscious levels to sway the voting public, what if all TV ads were, by law, only allowed to feature the candidate, with, say, the American flag as the backdrop, alone, speaking directly to the camera?

Unlike the twisters he famously chased in the movies, Bill Paxton was the kind of force of nature you ran toward and never away from.

Television, particularly as it becomes more and more serialised, comedies no longer have to tie the stories up neatly within 20-plus minutes. 'Arrested Development' had evolving storylines, as did both versions of 'The Office.' We're seeing that more and more. That allows it to be really, whatever the tone, almost literary.

What I love about DVD is that the quality is good.

With 'Apollo 13,' I wasn't sure the genre would work, because space films hadn't done that well.

I always think of the good comebacks on the car ride home.

Richard Dreyfuss, when we were doing 'American Graffiti,' was pumping me to vote for McGovern. But I think I wound up going for Nixon. I thought he could get us out of the Vietnam War quickly. Ha.

The hardest thing which I've experienced is calling up my father, Rance Howard, who's a wonderful actor, and telling him I've had to cut him out of the movie, which I've had to do twice. That's a lump-in-the-throat phone call.

I used to feel that I had to be dictatorial in order to be respected, but after I did a couple of TV movies, I began to see that authority came with the job. So I began to relax and let more people into the process, and my work really improved.

I was a Beach Boys guy, but I was won over. In '64, as the radio stations were creating this duel between The Beatles and The Beach Boys, I slowly but surely got won over by the Mop Tops.

There are creative benefits to getting older.

For my 10th birthday, what I wanted was Beatle boots and a Beatle wig. My parents couldn't find Beatle boots, but down at the dime store, Woolworths or someplace, they found a Beatle wig!

There's something rare and wonderful that's very particular to television, and it's when a great cast meets a great show runner/creator with the right set of characters to play. That's what happened with 'Arrested Development.' It happens every so often, but all too rarely on TV.

Imagine if the people who have lived and learned still had the vitality to act upon the hard learned lessons - and not just share in a conversation, but lead.

When 'Apollo 13' appeared as an opportunity and I began to tackle that in as authentic a way as I possibly could, I really became enthralled by the philosophical side of space travel and why we need to explore - what it means to us here on Earth - all of those things. I became a huge proponent.

I don't look ahead to the future as a vast, endless one. I've begun to feel the calendar pages turning.

It was always my dream to be a director. A lot of it had to do with controlling my own destiny, because as a young actor you feel at everyone's disposal. But I wanted to become a leader in the business.

I do really like serio-comic movies that treat real difficulties in a real way.

I didn't really listen to music when I was doing homework or when I - when I work on a script. I tend to drift to NPR and news.

I have a grandson who's both really interested in art and all things mechanical, so I think he'll get a huge kick out of 'Apollo 13' someday. And I think my granddaughters will enjoy 'Splash.'

I love leaving the door open to good ideas. I love the collaborative swirl. I get charged by problem-solving, usually under some kind of stress - the sun is going down, and we have eight minutes, and we have to solve it. Great things come out of it.