I'm feeling very vindicated that, when I see the audiences laughing and being moved, we were right. This movie was worth making, |
I'm not smart enough to write about something that didn't actually happen to me, ... It's not a plan. But I couldn't write a space movie if you put a gun to my head. |
If the powers that be see there is a bigger market out there, it will make it easier for the next time around. |
It changed my perspective. I understood what the father was thinking in making sure that he was providing for his family. I understood what my own father was thinking. It's a better movie now because I waited. |
It felt like such a right idea that it didn't bother me to put it away, because I knew it would be ready when it's ready, ... When I had kids, I realized I understood my parents better. I had more compassion for them and I look at my kids and realize, 'Oh, man. This is just the same cycle all over again.' |
It felt very natural right off the bat. It was really tailor-made for him and mine was tailor-made for me, so it was easy to jump into. |
It is not important to know what facts are true, ... The relationships portrayed are real. My mother did have a job interview with my father. She worked alongside him for awhile;, they dated, were married and had a family. She never did get to the World's Fair. |
It is really everybody's family, |
Once I let the story brew, I was able to sit down and write it in a couple of weeks, ... I always envisioned Peter in the role, because there are few actors like him. I wrote pages and pages of stuff for Peter to do, knowing we wouldn't have time for it. I wrote these long scenes with Peter ordering food in restaurants and things like that, because I know what he can do with material once he has his way with it. |
Once in a while you get a moment of clarity -- an inspiration -- and they don't come that frequently, |
One time I met him backstage to see him after a performance of a play he was in, ... He grabbed me by the shoulders. |
Over the years, there certainly have been plenty of ideas that I've had and given up on, but for this one, the only thing that was standing in its way was me doing it -- I just had to write it, ... And then if it didn't happen, it didn't happen. But I didn't want it to be for lack of effort on my part, so I had hunch that it would be a good story and that we would work well together. And it certainly worked out that way. |
People come up to us and ask how we knew so much about their own family, ... I'm talking about people from faraway places, too. I get people from Turkey and Chile coming up to me and saying I wrote about their family. |
People say to me, 'You made both these movies?' |
Peter Falk and my father are very much the same. |