One of the things I've learned as a filmmaker is to have some aspect of the movie be something that I admire greatly, whether that's an actor I'm working with, the subject matter, or a book.

The first piece of art that I ever bought-when I could afford it-was a Warhol sketch from the period when he was just getting out of doing commercial work and more into art. It's a sketch of a young guy's face. I guess the gallery that I bought it from thought I would like it because the young guy kind of looked like James Dean.

The general view is that actors start on soaps and then maybe graduate to prime-time television or film; normally you don't see a film actor going to do a soap.

There's a tendency, when you're directing yourself, not to give the performance as much care, because you feel like there's too much focus on yourself, or that all these people are just standing around setting everything up, waiting for you.

When I was a child, I wanted to be an actor, but I had really bad buckteeth. I didn't want to get braces, but my mom said I couldn't be an actor if I didn't get the braces. So, I got the braces.

When I went to film school about three years ago, the first two years you're required to make a series of short films. I started making films based on short poems.

I don't even like to sleep - I feel as if there's too much to do.

Acting is an art form and you want to take roles that are challenged and it's more of a challenge I think to play dark characters. Not that I want to always play those, but it is a challenge and challenges are rewarding and fun.

I'm a big cardigan sweater guy.

But I don't want to die! I have so much to do!

I get like six or so hours of sleep a night.

I still don't like going to bed alone.

I worked the drive-through at McDonald's and tried out different accents - Italian, Russian, Irish.

If the work is good, what does it matter? I'm doing it because I love it. Why not do as many things I love as I can? As long as the work is good.

It's hard when you're doing a film based on a true story to really figure out what all those relationships were.

When we were doing 'Freaks and Geeks', I didn't quite understand how movies and TV worked, and I would improvise even if the camera wasn't on me. I thought I was helping the other actors by keeping them on their toes, but nobody appreciated it when I would trip them up. So I was improvising a little bit back then, but not in a productive way.

I am not going to be the guy who's not pulling his weight.

I become kind of obsessive about research.

I don't like sleeping in a bed.

I was an English major at UCLA when I was 18, and then I left after a year to start acting. I was educating myself during that time.